Why this approach is important

When you are learning something new, such as cooking a dish or operating a machine, it can be helpful to watch someone demonstrating how to do the same task. Demonstration may appear to be a simple teaching strategy. However, the teacher plays a crucial role in involving students and maximising what they learn from it.

Teacher demonstrations are important because they:

• provide students with experiences of real events, phenomena and processes, helping them learn
• raise students’ interest and motivation
• enable you to focus students on a particular phenomenon or event, such as the starch test for foods
• can be used to develop and challenge students’ understanding
• can help students carry out their own practical work more effectively.

Pause for thought Think of the demonstrations you do or have done when teaching. Why do you use them? How do your students react to them?