Direct instruction methods are
easier to align with content standards, and they are easier to manage in the classroom. Much of the teacher’s work is in the preparation, when mistakes and dead-ends are invisible to students. There are fewer in-the-moment decisions to make during class. That’s not to say that the method is superior, but there is little doubt that these methods are easier for teachers to execute, a point made by
Dewey and by many observers since. When direct instruction goes wrong, it’s usually not because it is light in content but because the lesson has become an exercise in the memorization of trivia. One might say that you could hardly blames students for inattention to a lesson that is so far removed from their interests and passions, an attitude I detect in Wesch’s contribution.