10 Effective Instructional Strategies Every Teacher Should Know
Whether they’re teaching kindergarten, college, art, or physics, effective teachers use 10 essential strategies to create the types of classrooms where learning truly happens.
- Backward planning
- Formative assessment
- Data-driven instruction
- Differentiated instruction
- Culturally responsive teaching
- Activating prior knowledge
- Direct instruction
- Scaffolding
- Retrieval practice
- Metacognition
When teachers use these instructional strategies, they help students build lasting knowledge and skills while addressing barriers to learning. Using these strategies takes practice and expertise, which is why they’re so foundational to teacher-training and professional-development programs.
This guide explains how these core teaching strategies work, why they’re effective, and what they look like in real classrooms. The strategies below follow the complete instructional cycle, from planning lessons to helping students retain and apply what they’ve learned.
Key takeaways
- Effective teaching relies on a combination of instructional strategies rather than a single approach.
- The 10 strategies in this guide span the full instructional cycle, from planning and assessment to learning and reflection.
- Teachers can adapt these strategies to different subjects, grade levels, student needs, and learning goals.
Table of contents
- What are instructional strategies?
- Backward planning
- Formative assessment
- Data-driven instruction
- Differentiated instruction
- Culturally responsive teaching
- Activating prior knowledge
- Direct instruction
- Scaffolding
- Retrieval practice
- Metacognition
- How instructional strategies work together
- Frequently asked questions about instructional strategies
What are instructional strategies?
Instructional strategies are the techniques that teachers use to plan lessons, teach content, check for understanding, and maximize long-term retention. These 10 evidence-based teaching strategies span the major stages of instruction, from planning lessons and teaching new skills to assessing student learning and supporting long-term retention.
| Instructional strategy | Definition |
|---|---|
| Backward design | A unit-planning process where the teacher determines which skills the students need to learn and designs the final assessment and grading criteria before planning the daily lessons and activities for teaching those skills |
| Formative assessment | An ongoing process of gathering and analyzing data about students’ performance in order to tailor lessons to their levels of knowledge and learning needs |
| Data-driven instruction | Using the data about how students performed on tests and assignments to tailor lessons and learning content to their precise learning needs |
| Differentiated instruction | Providing multiple ways for students in a class to learn the same content in order to accommodate differences in students’ abilities, interests, and needs |
| Culturally responsive teaching | Creating a classroom environment and learning experiences that are relevant to students’ cultures and communities |
| Activating prior knowledge | Starting a lesson with an activity that bridges the lesson topic to students’ existing knowledge |
| Direct instruction | Explicitly showing students which steps and strategies they can use to successfully complete an academic task |
| Scaffolding | Using models, graphic organizers, and collaborative techniques that make it possible for students to practice using a new skill they haven’t fully developed yet |
| Retrieval practice | A quiz, writing prompt, or other classroom activity where students practice recalling the information they’re learning from memory |
| Metacognition | Self-awareness of thinking processes, strengths, and weaknesses, which helps students adjust behaviors and routines in order to improve academic performance |
Backward planning
Backward planning is an approach to unit planning where the teacher determines what students need to learn and designs the final assessment before deciding how to teach the content. The process generally follows this order:
- Identify the unit’s main learning objective (the main skill or concept that students need to learn) and break it into the smaller skills or concepts that students need to learn in order to achieve the goal.
- Create the summative assessment (the exam or assignment that assesses how well each student met the learning objective) along with the instructions and grading criteria (e.g., the essay prompt and rubric).
- Plan how to teach each skill or concept, including the lessons, activities, and pacing that align with students’ abilities, interests, and prior knowledge.
- Write the individual lesson plans that will prepare students for success on the summative assessment.
Why it matters: Backward design takes the guesswork out of lesson planning and helps teachers prioritize instructional activities that have the most impact on student learning.
- Identifies the core skills students need to learn, such as chronological organization, descriptive details, dialogue, quotation marks, and the past tense
- Creates a grading rubric and assignment instructions for the summative assessment: a narrative essay
- Plans ways to teach the students how to use descriptive details, quotation marks, and the other narrative writing skills
- Writes lesson plans for each of the skills students need to learn in order to write narrative essays
Formative assessment
Formative assessment is an ongoing process of collecting evidence about student learning in order to adjust instruction to meet students’ needs. The evidence comes from the assignments and classroom activities that students complete before the summative assessment, such as unit pretests, homework assignments, quizzes, daily writing prompts, discussions, and exit tickets.
These activities become formative assessments when teachers use the results to identify students’ progress toward specific learning objectives. While observing classroom activities or grading assignments, teachers look for patterns of error and gaps in knowledge for individual learners and the class as a whole. For example, a teacher might:
- Make a note of which homework questions multiple students got wrong
- Keep data about which tasks are consistently challenging for a specific student
- Notice when students take longer than expected to complete a task
- Keep a record of the specific grammar mistakes in student writing samples
Formative assessment provides the evidence teachers need to make instructional decisions. This data becomes the foundation for another essential teaching strategy: data-driven instruction.
Why it matters: When teachers use formative assessment, they can identify challenges early, provide targeted support, and adjust lessons before students fall behind.
Data-driven instruction
While formative assessment provides evidence about student learning, data-driven instruction uses that evidence to make instructional decisions. Data-driven instruction involves using the data from formative assessments to tailor lesson plans to students’ current level of understanding. Some of the ways that teachers use data-driven instruction include:
- Planning a unit with lessons and activities that target the skills gaps that affect most of the students or the class as a whole (as observed in a pretest or similar diagnostic assessment)
- Adjusting future lesson plans or the overall unit schedule while a unit is already underway
- Reflecting on how the previous lessons and activities affected student understanding and finding alternative ways to reteach the content
- Providing individual learners with appropriate interventions or 1:1 support
A language arts teacher assigns an informal writing assignment and collects data on which types of errors are most prevalent. She notices that students consistently struggle with when to use commas. During the next class period, she reviews the comma rules and has students work in groups to find and fix comma errors.
Differentiated instruction
Differentiated instruction moves beyond the one-size-fits-all approach to acknowledge that students have different levels of readiness and learning needs. When teachers differentiate instruction, they create multiple ways for students to access the same content, develop the same skills, and demonstrate their understanding. Differentiation can be based on students’ abilities, interests, or preferences and applies to four aspects of the classroom:
- Content: Giving students multiple ways to access material, such as audiobooks, different levels of the same text, or texts with visual aids
- Process: Providing different activities or learning experiences for students to develop the same skills (often via small groups or learning stations)
- Product: Allowing students different ways to demonstrate their learning, such as a presentation, essay, or video project
- Learning environment: Creating a classroom setup and routines that support students’ different learning needs
Why it matters: Differentiation makes the classroom more inclusive and prevents students from falling through the cracks because of challenges that are unrelated to the learning objectives.
Culturally responsive teaching
Culturally responsive teaching (CRT) is an approach that connects instruction to students’ cultural backgrounds, experiences, and communities. Teachers who use CRT create learning environments where students can see their identities represented, make connections between academic content and their lived experiences, and engage with multiple perspectives. Some of the many ways that teachers practice CRT include:
- Selecting learning materials that represent diverse cultures, histories, and perspectives
- Providing opportunities for students to connect academic concepts to their experiences, communities, and prior knowledge
- Encouraging students to share their perspectives and use their cultural knowledge as a resource for learning
- Creating an inclusive classroom environment where students feel valued and respected
Why it matters: Culturally responsive teaching helps students see connections between academic content and their experiences while creating an environment where all students feel valued and included.
Activating prior knowledge
Activating prior knowledge is an instructional strategy that helps students connect new information to what they already know. Also called schema activation, this strategy is based on scientific evidence that people learn new concepts more effectively when they can connect them to existing knowledge and experiences.
When students encounter new information, their brains organize it by connecting it to related concepts, experiences, and memories they already have. By intentionally activating students’ prior knowledge, teachers help students build connections that make new information easier to understand and remember.
Teachers can activate prior knowledge at the beginning of a lesson or unit in several ways, including:
- Writing prompts: Asking students to write what they already know about a topic or describe a related experience
- Class discussions: Inviting students to share ideas, predictions, or questions about the topic
- Video clips: Sharing a high-interest video that connects students’ current interests or a familiar concept to the topic they’re about to study
- Mind maps: Building a collaborative mind map on the board to help students make connections between related topics
Why it matters: Activating prior knowledge helps students make meaningful connections between new and existing information, which improves comprehension, engagement, and long-term retention.
Direct instruction
Direct instruction involves making the process for learning a new skill or completing a complex task explicit and visible. Rather than expecting students to figure out a process through trial and error, teachers unpack the steps and underlying strategies that students can use to successfully complete a task. Examples of direct instruction include:
- Working a math problem on the board while the students observe and explaining the reasoning behind each step
- Explicitly teaching young readers how to decode the letters in an unfamiliar word
- Breaking up an essay or presentation into smaller assignments (which can be used as formative assessments), such as the thesis statement, an essay outline, and a rough draft
Why it matters: Direct instruction removes hidden barriers to learning by making expectations and successful approaches clear and accessible to all students instead of only rewarding the students who already have experience with the skills you’re assessing.
Scaffolding
A scaffold in education is a temporary support that helps students successfully complete tasks that they’re not ready to perform independently. Scaffolding helps students gradually work toward completing a task or process independently. Common scaffolding techniques include:
- Models and examples of the type of work students should strive for
- Graphic organizers that help students organize information and connect ideas
- Templates and sentence starters to jumpstart the writing process
- Working in pairs or groups to practice a task that students will eventually do independently
One of the most common versions of scaffolding is gradual release of responsibility (aka, I do → we do → you do, or direct instruction → guided practice → independent practice):
- I do: The teacher models the process via direct instruction
- We do: The teacher and students complete the process together via guided practice, or the teacher completes part of the task, and the students finish it
- You do: Students apply the skill independently
Why it matters: Scaffolding gives students the tools and confidence to engage in challenging learning experiences that might otherwise be out of reach
Retrieval practice
Retrieval practice strengthens learning by asking students to recall information from memory rather than simply reviewing it. When students practice retrieving knowledge through active recall, they strengthen their ability to access that information later. Types of retrieval practice include:
- Low-stakes quizzes
- Practice questions
- Trivia games
- Flashcards
- Daily writing prompts
Why it matters: Retrieval practice strengthens students’ ability to recall information so that they can access it more easily later. It also leads to better outcomes on final exams and standardized tests.
Metacognition
Metacognition, or “thinking about thinking,” is a strategy that students use to self-monitor their learning. Students use metacognitive skills when they reflect on what they know, identify areas where they need support, and evaluate which strategies help them learn effectively. Teachers can develop students’ metacognitive awareness by:
- Asking students to explain their thinking and reasoning
- Having students set learning goals and reflect on their progress
- Using self-assessments before and after assignments
- Assigning reflection essays, learning journals, or error logs
Why it matters: Metacognition helps students become independent learners who make intentional decisions about how to approach assignments.
How instructional strategies work together
In the most effective classrooms, the 10 core teaching strategies work together to support student learning and improve academic outcomes. The following example shows how a 6th-grade language arts teacher incorporates all 10 strategies within a single unit on the 5-paragraph essay.
- Backward planning: The teacher reviews the state learning standards for 6th-grade essay writing, designs a grading rubric, and then plans lessons that teach the different essay-writing skills.
- Activating prior knowledge: At the beginning of the first lesson, the teacher assigns an in-class writing prompt: “What is an essay, and how is it different from other types of writing?”
- Direct instruction: The teacher breaks down the essay-writing process into smaller steps, such as writing body paragraphs, and gives explicit instructions on how to complete each step.
- Scaffolding: The teacher provides students with models of effective 5-paragraph essays and sentence starters that they can use to create topic sentences.
- Culturally responsive teaching: The teacher uses essay models and writing prompts that reflect a variety of cultural backgrounds and issues that connect to the communities and experiences of the students in the class.
- Retrieval practice: At the beginning of some class periods, students take quizzes on the essay-writing strategies that the teacher has covered so far.
- Formative assessment: While grading the pop quizzes and reviewing students’ partial drafts, the teacher records data about the writing and grammar concepts that students are struggling with the most.
- Data-driven instruction: The teacher uses this formative assessment data to revise upcoming lessons and incorporate activities that address the most urgent gaps.
- Differentiated instruction: During a differentiated grammar workshop, students are grouped according to the grammar concerns that affect them the most and complete practice exercises that target their specific needs.
- Metacognition: At the end of the unit, students complete a self-assessment about which aspects of their essays were most and least effective and reflect on how to approach the next essay assignment differently.
Frequently asked questions about instructional strategies
- What is the difference between formative and summative assessment?
-
Formative assessment is an ongoing process that teachers use to monitor student learning and adjust instruction based on what they discover. It can include quizzes, writing prompts, discussions, exit tickets, and other activities that provide evidence of students’ understanding during a lesson or unit.
Summative assessment evaluates how well students have met learning objectives at the end of a unit or course, often through a final exam, project, or other graded assignment. While formative assessment helps teachers decide how to adjust instruction, summative assessment measures what students have learned.
Understanding the difference between formative and summative assessment helps teachers choose the best instructional strategies for their students. Quillbot’s AI Chat can help you brainstorm ways to use effective strategies in your classroom.
- What are the elements of a lesson plan?
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A lesson plan typically includes elements such as:
- Learning objectives
- Descriptions of tasks and activities
- Details on task setup, monitoring, and feedback
- Length of the lesson or session
- Timings for each stage
- Details about the class or group
- How the lesson connects to other lessons and the course/syllabus
- Materials and resources needed
- Anticipated challenges
Why not prompt Quillbot’s free AI lesson plan generator to draft you a lesson plan that contains all of these elements?
