- Focus on real-world scenarios. This not only gives live context to students, but also enables practical application of new ideas to situations they are already familiar with.
- At every stage enable dialogue. Applying new ideas will come with error and experimentation. Always allow time for students to pause and assess what they are doing; allow also for discussion and peer feedback.
- Provide questions instead of answers. Pose thought-provoking questions and problem-statements, rather than providing rote answer-statements.
- In the same vein, discover Socratic Questioning. Resist declaring students “wrong” or “right”, instead probe a student's answer with further questions to elicit deeper thought. Question such as ‘Could you explain further?’ ‘Is this always the case?’, ‘Why do you think that this assumption holds here?’ ‘Why do you say that?’, ‘What is the counter-argument?’, ‘Can/did anyone see this another way?’
- In terms of class-time consider a time limit. In terms of exploratory activity students should not spend too long on a specific project or problem. A good rule of thumb is an equal ratio of minutes-to-age plus 2 minutes to maximum of 30 minutes, e.g. the average 15 year-old can be expected to focus on absorbing new information for 17 minutes.
