Learning Outcomes:
At the end of the lesson, the students should be able to:
1. Differentiate an approach, a strategy or method and a technique; and
2. Prepare lesson plans and instructional aids as they facilitate the discussion and demonstration of and explain the features of the different approaches and methods in teaching Social Studies.
Approach
Approach refers to the philosophical framework of any given subject. It also pertains to the general operation that a teacher observes when he teaches a subject, It includes the various strategies, techniques, and materials to be used; the principles of teaching related to such strategies and techniques; and the use of various materials. It is prescriptive in nature and meaning; each subject or course has a prescribed approach to be used in order to make teaching effective. Under an approach are specified strategies to be used so that its rationale is attained.
Strategy
Strategy comes from the Greek word "strategos indicating a person who is a general in war who6e main function is to devise war plans or steps to enable him to accomplish his goal of winning the war. It can be used interchangeably with method, because this concept consists of steps to be followed so that our objective may be realized. Strategy or method, therefore, is procedural because it consists of steps or procedures to be observed by a teacher
Technique
Technique on the other hand, is stylistic or personalistic. It is a manner by which a teacher does a particular step of a lesson. Thus, in motivating a lesson, one teacher may be lively; another one may be formal another one may use a picture; another teacher may just verbalize, and so on. Therefore, no teacher will be the same as the rest in doing one step of a lesson or n executing a strategy like showing a picture, and others. However, outstanding teachers manifest very good techniques compared with newly hired teachers without experiences.
Approaches in Teaching Social Studies (Sibika at Kultura/HEKASI)
The following are the basic approaches observed by teachers in teaching Social Studies.
1. The Discovery Approach
The pupils are assisted to look for the answers to the problems under the effective guidance of the teacher. For instance, the teacher is teaching about Andres Bonifacio, he will not start by saying: "Class, today, we shall study the life of Andres Bonifacio. You know class, Bonifacio was the founder of the Katipunan. He was a poor boy who educated himself.
2. The Process Approach
The main purpose of this approach is to develop various skills among the pupils. The said skills may be simple or complex.
Examples of single processes are:
a) observing
b) classifying
c) listening
d) guessing
3. The Inquiry Approach
The sole purpose of this approach is to develop the learner’s interest in inquiring or asking questions about a given material, situation, or subject matter being studied. In this manner, the critical thinking is given a chance to be manifested.
4. The Integrated Approach
There are many issues surrounding the environment of the learners. These issues should be included in the lessons under Social Studies. Studying such issues is an environmental destruction, family planning, drug abuse, pollution, justice peace, proper sanitation, human rights abuse, conservation green revolution and others will enable the pupils to understand better the place they live in and the role they play in the society
5. The Multimedia Approach
Teachers should make use of all forms of media--- from pictures to films in order to arouse the interest of the pupils and to generate concrete learning, for obvious reasons. Pictures are good but using film or actual field trips to particular places can certainly concretize pupils' perceptions about the subject matter.
6. The Value Clarification Approach
The purpose of this approach is to clarity the value chosen by the learner. For instance, he should tell why he should join a cleanliness campaign in the community. The advantages and disadvantages of such undertaking should be properly explained. A pupil should not be criticized for choosing a negative value. Instead, the teacher should try his best to redirect his value toward the positive through skillful teaching as explained earlier.
7. The Interdisciplinary/Multidisciplinary Approach
Teachers must not limit students' learnings in Social Studies (Sibika at Kultura/HEKASI) alone. They should relate their subject matter to other disciplines like science, math, music, art, and other areas. By doing this, they appeal to the various interests of the different pupils inside the classroom.
8. The Mastery Learning Approach
This approach calls for setting up the desired performance level of success of the pupils being taught by the teacher whom evaluating learning or when doing activities to answer the problem posed to them. Bright students may have the 80% up to 90% level of success. Average pupils may give 65% to 75%, but poor pupils may go as low as 50% to 60%.
9. The Conceptual Approach
The purpose of this approach is to make the pupils learn how to get and identify facts and information. From these, they will identify the concepts and sub-concepts. Under each concept and sub-concept, sub-generalizations will be formulated. For each concept, one generalization will be arrived at based on the sub-generalizations.