What is it?
In the At Bats strategy, you, as the teacher, teach the students a skill clearly and fully. Then, you allow them to practice the skill as many times as possible. It emphasizes repetition to make the skill come naturally. The students learn the skill through basic instructions from the teacher. The teacher then gives them many, many opportunities to practice the skill. A way to manage time in the classroom is through use of the 3-30-30 rule. The 3 represents 3 minutes of clear instructions where the teacher focuses on making sure that everyone understands and gets started on the task. The first 30 represents 30 seconds of circulating the classroom offering individual assistance. The second 30 represents 30 seconds of circulating to make sure everyone is still on task. During these 30 seconds, the teacher should only make brief comments and assess the entire classroom’s actions in order to keep them working. It’s important to note that the 30 second bursts alternate. Enough practice should be given in order for the skill to become second nature. The students will work hard until they can perform the task by themselves. In order for this strategy to be effective, it’s important that all aspects of the skill are assessed through the practice. Different variables should be changed so that the skill is learned completely. Also, there should be tasks that are slightly more difficult prepared for students who master the task more quickly than the rest.
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Why does it work?Rote learning is a type of learning associated with Long Term Memory. It’s not known to be the most effective, but it is known for the automatic nature of the skill after the skill has been learned. In order for the skill to be learned, there needs to be a way for the information to be easily retrieved. At Bats proves to be effective as long as there is enough repetition. Through repetition, the teacher is ensuring the information will be easily retrieved from his/her student’s memory. The At Bats strategy is based on baseball. It’s called At Bats because it focuses on the concept of learning how to hit. Everyone would agree that the best way to learn how to hit a baseball is by practicing. The student needs to be at bat as much as possible in order to learn how to hit. A less effective way to teach how to hit would be to be lectured about hitting a baseball or to watch someone else hit. Tactile learning is most effective for learning how to hit. This shows that the modality in which this strategy is used also needs to be considered.
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Example:I plan on teaching elementary school with a concentration in math. The At Bats strategy would be useful in math because children need to learn to recall basic addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division problems pretty quickly. First, I will teach my students the basic concept of addition. I’ll walk them through some examples. Then, I will use math worksheets with lots of similar problems in order to get my students to practice the math. For example: 3+7, 6+4, 7+4, 6+5, 5+7, 7+2, etc. The children can also practice with flashcards or a game that requires that they practice these problems. They will work on these problems until they can quickly and easily do them on their own. Once they master simple addition, they can move on to harder problems.
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TLAC | AT BATS Strategy |