EDU 555

CURRICULUM AND INSTRUCTION

[ARTICLE REVIEW REPORT]
TITLE: STACK THE DECK IN FAVOR OF YOUR
STUDENT BY USING THE FOUR ACE OF EFFECTIVE
TEACHING

NAME : SITI AISHAH BINTI AZMI

ID NO : 2013434436
GROUP: ED 247 4B
PREPARED FOR: EN. MUHAMAD FURKAN MAT SALLEH
EN. MOHAMAD HISYAM ISMAIL

Stack the deck in favour of your students by using the four aces of effective teaching
is the title of my article review task. The authors of this article are Sean M. Bulger from
Department of Kinesiology and Athletics, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, Derek J. Mohr
from Department of Health, Leisure and Exercise Science, Appalaichian State University and
Richard T. Walls from College of Resources and Education (Research and Training Center),
West Virginia University. This journal of effective teaching is published in the year of 2002.
This article is actually about the recommendation of method in teaching in order to
develop effective instructional practice among teachers. This article also tells the readers on
what teacher need to apply in their instructional skill as to improve the lesson to become
more effective. This article is based on the research literature on teacher effectiveness and
from summarizing the body of the research. The objectives of this article are to explain the
four aces of effective teaching as guidance for the teacher to improve their instructional
methods. Based on research of teacher effectiveness, the author had stress on two critical
variables that commonly become a teacher problem in teaching. The first one is, teacher had
expert in subject matter knowledge, but fail to deliver the content due to lack of skill in
teaching and vice versa. Therefore, as to solve this problem the author suggest these four aces
of effective teaching that will help the teacher to improve their methods of teaching.
Author has well explained about the four methods that teacher can applied in their
teaching and learning process in school as to make the instruction process become more
effective. The four ace of effective teaching that has been stated in this article is outcomes,
clarity, engagement and enthusiasm. The author, Walls, 1999 has summarized the most
recommendation of effective teaching method from the teaching effectiveness research
literature wrote by Rosenshine and Frust on 1973. According to Rosenshine and Frust
(1973), there are five most important criteria for teacher effectiveness in teaching which are
clarity, variability, enthusiasm, task-oriented, and student opportunity to learn criterion
material.
The first ace of effective teaching that has been stated by the author is outcomes. The
importance of outcomes is it will make student be more focus on their learning goals.
Outcomes really important for student as it will give direction to the student on what will they
learn on a particular session of teaching and learning. The important of outcomes is not only
good for student, but also benefits the teacher. From learning outcomes teacher will used it to

assess the understanding of their student and evaluate their own instructional either effective
or not.
Clarity is the second ace of effective teaching that stated in this article. Clarity can be
defines as clearness. Clarity in instruction is really important as to develop effective teaching
environment. Teacher need to clearly communicate information towards their student (Grice
& Skinner, 2010). In the teaching process, teacher will become the main roles, and they need
to provide student with detail direction about the content and clear explanation of the subject
matter. Teacher need to have good method of deliver the content of knowledge to their
student. Teacher need to provide the student with good example, illustration, used simple
word for explanation and other material that can enhance understanding of the student.
Teacher also need to give sufficient time for their student to ask question, so that the teacher
can explain and make it clear enough to understand the concept of learning on certain period
of learning.
Third ace of effective teaching in this article is engagement. Engagement is really
important in process of teaching and learning. Teacher need to engage to their student in
entire lesson period of time. Prolonged engagement is needed and is include in introduction,
body and closure of the lessons. Teacher should limit the time for lecture session to not more
than thirty minutes before make some activity that will engage the student with the learning
material (Walls & Cather, 1987). In order to make the student focus and engage with the
lessons, teacher need to create educational environment like some activity that related to the
content of learning. Thus, there will be two way of communication between teacher and
student. If there is only one way communication from teacher, teaching session is not
effective. The student will felt bored, ignored in the class and student also feels unmotivated
to learn. To make student become more motivated to learn, teacher need be creative. Teacher
can create some fun activities that related to the material of learning and from those activities,
teacher can assess student understanding, knowledge, skill and attitude. Thus, student will be
more motivated to learn without feel bored and teacher can easily make some assessment
towards their student.
Finally the fourth aces that author has stated in this article is enthusiasm. This fourth
aces is depend on the teacher attitude itself. Enthusiasm can be defines as strong feeling of
active interest on something. The author simply say that, if the teacher are very excited or
enjoy to teach their student in the class, the student also will elicit the same expression as

their teacher do. Student will become more motivated and excited to learn. Teacher that
genuinely shows their care toward the student, tend to gain student cooperation (Jones &
Jones, 2010). Teacher can develop this characteristic by showing their passion on particular
subject they used to teach to their student, always make student active in the class, and
teacher also need to move in between their student in class. With all these, teacher will have
more confident and become professional in handling their class more effectively.
In this article also, the author has write about the sample lesson that describe about
component of effective lesson. In this effective lesson, shows how these four aces of effective
teaching have been applied in the sample lesson. There are five component of effective lesson
that the author has stated. There are instant activity, lesson objectives, advance organizer,
lesson body, and lesson closure. The author clearly saying that instant activity is used as to
engage student at the beginning of the lessons. The purpose of this instant activity are,
provide an information for upcoming lesson, as review of previous lesson and as management
technique for the teacher to organized the class. For example, teacher is asking their student
to give their opinion on the reading task of previous lesson. After instant activity has been
conduct, teacher need to clearly state the outcomes of learning. The outcomes will tell the
student the idea of what they will learn at the end of the lessons. These outcomes need to be
clear, have related to the desire course content and measurable. Teacher also need to used
advance organizer for organize their material of teaching. The example of advance organizer
state by author is an outline of topic, diagram or concept map of some topic to be learnt. It
gives benefit for the learner about an overview of the scope and sequence of lessons and
teacher can manage well their instruction material. The fourth component is body lesson. This
part is really important because, teacher will deliver major content of the lesson towards their
student. At this part, teacher needs to apply the four aces of effective teaching in order to have
an effective learning. Teacher should clearly deliver the content of the lesson towards their
student, engaged with student by using some fun activity, and provides outcomes of learning
so that student can achieve at the end of the lessons. Lesson closure is the last part of sample
lesson. Here, teacher can used to clarify the body lesson, restated the outcomes of the lesson,
assess student understanding and also state the upcoming lesson.
After I read this article, I agree with all points that the author has been wrote in this
article because for me, teacher not only need to excel in knowledge subject matter but also
needs to have good skill in delivering the lesson content to their student and knowing how to
make the teaching and learning session become more effective. With these four aces of

effective teaching state by the author in this article, it actually provides some idea for us as
future teacher to conduct the lesson in the real class environment and make it more
interesting. The ideas in this article are clearly explained and easy to understand as the author
provides some example to support their explanation. As I relate this article with my course
subject curriculum and instruction, this article very useful as we can actually applied this
method of teaching in our microteaching task.
As to fulfil our needs of PPPM (Pelan Pembangunan Pendidikan Malaysia), teacher in
Malaysia, need to improve their teaching skill in order to create an effective teaching in class.
Teacher need to be more creative in engage their student and ensure their student gain all the
knowledge that has been taught in the class. As we want to develop student with complete
value of intellectual, spiritual, emotional, and physical, in order to achieve this kind of value,
first, teaching and learning needs to be effective and teacher need to be creative and polished
their instructional strategy.
To sum up all points, in order to create effective learning environment, teacher need to
improve their instructional skill on delivering the content of knowledge towards their student.
With this four ace principle of effective teaching which are outcomes, clarity, engagement
and enthusiasm, it helps the teacher to create the effective teaching and enhance the student
academic achievement. Thus, Malaysian education will produce student with complete aspect
of intellectual, spiritual, emotional and physical in the future.

REFERENCES

Bulger, S. M., Mohr, D. J., & Walls, R. T. (2002). Stack the deck in favour of your students
by using the four aces of effective teaching. The Journal of Effective Teaching, 5(2),
Retrieved April 2nd, 2015, from http://uncw.edu/cte/et/articles/bulger/

Miller, P. (1987). Ten characteristic of a Good Teacher, 25(1), Retrieved April 2nd, 2015, from
http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ971241.pdf

Rosenshine, B. and M. Furst. (1971). Research on teacher performance criteria. In B.O.

Smith (ed.). Research in teaching education. pp. 27-72. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall

Santrock, J. W. (2012). Educational Psychology fifth edition. Managing the Classroom. New
York:McGraw-Hill