How to implement Engelmann's Direct Instruction in Primary Schools

Implementing a Direct Instruction (Siegfried Engelmann) programme, in a primary school: challenges and opportunities

by Dr Nazam Hussain, Educational Psychologist

16 November 2022

From working as an educational psychologist, and having discussions with class teachers in relation to mastering early academic skills/ knowledge the following questions keep coming up:

· What should I teach my students?

· How do I know in which order to teach things?

· How do I explain concepts with clarity?

· How do I know if someone has misunderstood?

· How do I measure progress within a scheme of work?

· How do I re-teach the low attaining students?

After reading about Project Follow Through, content analysis, and instructional design, I thought Direct Instruction (DI) programmes could help with answering some of these questions. These are an explicit, carefully sequenced and scripted models of instruction, which have been developed and refined through decades of field testing. The key components of DI are characterised by precise example sequences, high pace questioning, continuous, instant feedback, extended practice drills and rapid correction of misconceptions; as well as high levels of monitoring through lesson progress charts and programme-based mastery tests. As a result, these programmes provide carefully considered skill/knowledge acquisition and progression, appropriate level of challenge for motivation and enable development of fluency. There are numerous programmes which focus on a range of curriculum areas including spelling, number concepts, decoding, reading mastery, writing expression and language. DI (upper case) is different to di (lower case) which relates to Barak Rosenshine’s principles of instruction. Despite some similarities, there are significant differences between di and DI in terms of curriculum design, faultless instruction and teaching generalisable skills.

For more details, see:

di lower-case www.zigsite.com ('DI Articles' / Critique of Lowercased di (direct instruction) 2014)

DI programme https://www.nifdi.org/

In September 2019, I embarked on a project alongside the National Institute for Direct Instruction, (NIFDI), and two primary schools in Bradford. This was done to explore the impact and feasibility of implementing Direct Instruction (Engelmann) programmes (Reading Mastery and Language) in Reception classrooms. The schools received training from NIFDI in September 2019, as well as on-going implementation support and coaching throughout the year. I gathered pre-intervention data around language, early grapheme-phoneme correspondence skills for children who just started their reception year and interviewed teachers and teaching assistants delivering the programme. My plans to gather post intervention data and interview teachers for a third time, were curtailed by Covid 19 restrictions in March 2020; other work commitments were prioritised in the following school year.

I interviewed those delivering DI in November 2019 and February 2020 and analysed the data. The following themes emerged:

Optimal scheduling arrangement – When and how to schedule the DI programmes within a reception class (separate to or a replacement of English and maths sessions).

Pedagogical dilemmas –Tension between child centred activities and increasing pressure to deliver programmes which were more explicit and structured.

Decisions regarding mastery – All of the staff reported the difficulty of deciding when mastery had been achieved, which then impacted on the pace of the session.

Transfer effect – All of the staff reported using DI techniques (choral responding, signalling, teacher-student game, ‘my turn/ your turn’ and correction procedures) to other aspects of their teaching, such as phonics, early number teaching as well as general transitions and school routines.

Group differences –Most of the staff reported positive gains for the middle and low performing groups.

Fidelity – Everyone reported that they found some of the scripts, (particularly exercises which involved pictures) fairly straightforward, but when different exercises involved different scripts, it felt difficult to implement. Some teachers reported that they adapted some names of objects in line with British vocabulary.

In July 2022, I returned to one of the schools who have continued to implement whole cohort and small group DI programmes of work. The school have received on-going training, coaching and support from NIFDI, and they have seen progress with the children who are receiving it. During the visit, I had a stimulating conversation with the lead DI practitioner. Interestingly, the conversation was not about the child being the problem, a fixed view of ability, generic teaching philosophies or searching for distal causal explanations which can sometimes dominate discussions for low attaining pupils, but rather, our conversation focused on; the importance of example sequences, fluency and mastery assessments, authentic progress measures, pace of lessons and clear actionable strategies teachers could use. I believe this shift in mind set and focusing on instructional and curricular design has been one of the benefits of implementing DI programmes.

This blog, although not made explicit, is linked with the purpose and values of education, when and how intensely to introduce explicit instruction and the imposition of developmental or attainment expectations on young children. DI provides a clear strategy around deployment of teaching assistants and consistent progress monitoring for all groups. I think teachers should have some awareness of how curricular and instruction was designed by Engelmann, and observe some DI sessions if they can, particularly, if they don’t agree with the methods.

If you would like further information about DI, I recommend a guide by Shepard Barbash: Clear Teaching: with Direct Instruction, Siegfried Engelmann Discovered a Better Way of Teaching.