Teaching skills can be judged a special case of that informal teaching which becomes a passing brief for most of us. For although professional teachers must presumably bank on the same human talents for helping and informing others resorted to in less formal settings, they will also adapt these talents to larger, more diverse cohorts of students. Over time, complexities of preparing different sorts of learners for their future lives modifies skills otherwise acquired naturally, making professional teaching both similar to and distinct from lay teaching in the way skills are refined and deployed. This conclusion reminds us of how context constrains teaching; but it also reminds us of how long-term intention affects skill, since the reason why we ask professional teachers to work in institutions like schools has to include the special purposes such institutions have (Bennett, S.N. and Carré, C.G. 1993).
Arguably, it is the special purposes of professional teaching which entail its having to be organized within institutions so it can be systematically programmed and linked directly to its goals. This is a fairly obvious conclusion to reach, as the product of any sort of teaching must, somehow, call into existence suitable processes.
Psychology tries to arrive at general theories that can help us understand basic areas such as learning, memory, motivation, etc. However, practical education is a complex situation in which to apply psychological theories, and there are often many factors which interact or combine to give rise to a number of different effects. Some evidence about the way in which academic achievement can be the outcome of the interaction between home- and school-based factors, with initial home-based advantages being consolidated by early educational success (Diamond, C.T.P. 1991).
It is therefore always important to evaluate real-life applications of psychological ideas, rather than rely on ideas that......
