A great deal is being made in Australia at the moment about the need for teachers to be direct and explicit in terms of the instruction that they give to students. The suggestion is that students learn better if the teacher and they have a primary relationship in terms of input from the teacher and response by the students.

The irony is that this used to be the method under which teachers Were trained in Australia up until the beginning of the 1970s. From there I mean it seems that we’ve gotten away from direct teaching and gone increasingly down the road of student-directed learning what would you like to learn which leaves Students in a situation of fuzziness when it comes to basic could meet of understanding in the areas of literacy and numeracy.

Proper teaching these days is also distorted by technological lines and other gimmicks that supposedly stand in the place of the teacher – so using computer technology and going online to find the answers to things and now of course using artificial intelligence to help in the shaping of responses to assignments.

Teacher directes learning has become almost anachronistic in some places.

We need to get rid of all the aids and the implements and get back to the simple teacher-people relationship with teaching and learning that is direct, explicit and proper. Students need to understand concepts and have head knowledge of key essentials. 

Alas, I think that my wish might be flying in the wind. Not only are the students less able to learn than used to be the case – their teachers are less able to teach.