LET Elementary Principles and Strategies of Teaching — Principles of Teaching and Instructional PlanningRevision Notes

Exam Tips

• When a scenario describes a teacher who asks learners to investigate before explaining, the principle being applied is active, learner-centered learning.
• When a scenario shows a teacher starting with what pupils already know (e.g., local experiences, prior lessons), the principle is 'from known to unknown' or building on prior knowledge.
• The phrase 'facilitating learning' rather than 'delivering content' is a cue that the item is testing the learner-centered principle.
• Look for the word 'transfer' in scenario stems — if pupils are asked to use a skill in a new situation (not just repeat it), transfer is involved.

Key Points

• Teaching is a purposeful, goal-directed activity — every lesson must begin with a clear, learner-centered outcome.
• Learning is an active process: the learner constructs meaning through doing, not through passive reception of information.
• Instruction should move from the known to the unknown, from concrete to abstract, from simple to complex, and from near to far — this is the principle of building on prior knowledge.
• The whole learner matters: cognitive readiness, emotional state, and motivation all affect learning outcomes.
• Individual differences are the norm, not the exception — learners differ in ability, pace, background, learning style, and interest, requiring differentiated instruction.
• Timely, specific feedback and appropriate reinforcement guide learning by strengthening correct responses and correcting errors.
• Teaching for transfer is the ultimate goal — lessons must help learners apply skills and concepts to new, real-life situations beyond the classroom.
• The best teacher does not merely talk the most; rather, the best teacher arranges conditions so learners can discover, practice, and apply knowledge independently.

Definitions

Section Title

Principles of Effective Teaching

Common Mistakes

• Confusing teacher activity with learning activity — a teacher who 'discusses the water cycle for 30 minutes' is not necessarily facilitating active learning.
• Assuming that covering content means learning has occurred — coverage is not the same as mastery.
• Ignoring the affective dimension of learning — a pupil who is anxious, hungry, or bullied will not learn efficiently regardless of how good the lesson is; RA 7610 (Child Protection) reminds teachers to safeguard the emotional safety of every child.
• Treating all learners as identical in pace and background — failing to differentiate is one of the most common instructional errors in Philippine classrooms.

Exam Tips

• The FASTEST way to spot a behavioral objective on the LET: Does the verb describe something you can SEE or HEAR the learner doing? If yes, it is behavioral.
• Mager's four parts are tested by underlining one part of a full objective and asking what component it is. Practice: 'Given ten addition problems (C), the Grade 2 pupil (A) will solve (B) at least eight correctly (D).'
• SMART Relevant = the objective must relate to the curriculum goal or real-life need of the learner — not just any measurable task.
• When asked to IMPROVE a non-behavioral objective, replace the internal verb with an observable one: 'appreciate poetry' becomes 'recite a chosen poem with correct pacing and expression.'

Key Points

• An instructional objective describes what the LEARNER will be able to do after instruction — never what the teacher will do.
• Behavioral (performance) objectives use observable, measurable action verbs so that anyone watching can see whether the behavior occurred.
• Non-behavioral objectives use internal verbs like 'understand,' 'appreciate,' 'know,' or 'value' — worthy aims but not directly measurable for planning or testing.
• Mager's ABCD model provides four components: Audience (who), Behavior (what observable action), Condition (under what circumstances), and Degree (how well — the criterion).
• The SMART checklist ensures objectives are Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-bound.
• Measurability comes from the behavior verb and the degree criterion together — without both, an objective cannot be reliably assessed.
• On the LET, a typical distractor pairs 'understand' or 'know' against 'identify' or 'solve' and asks which is a properly stated behavioral objective — always choose the observable verb.

Definitions

Section Title

Instructional Objectives: Behavioral Objectives, Mager's ABCD, and SMART

Common Mistakes

• Writing objectives that describe TEACHER activity: 'To present the water cycle using a diagram' — this describes what the teacher does, not what the learner achieves.
• Using vague verbs like 'understand,' 'know,' 'appreciate,' or 'be aware of' in a formally stated lesson objective — these cannot be measured directly.
• Forgetting the Degree (criterion) in Mager's model — an objective without a standard of acceptable performance is incomplete.
• Confusing Condition and Degree: Condition = the 'given' (e.g., 'given a map'), Degree = the standard (e.g., 'with 85% accuracy').
• Writing objectives that are too broad for a single lesson (e.g., 'understand Philippine history') — objectives must be lesson-sized and achievable in one session.

Exam Tips

• MEMORIZE the revised order with this mnemonic: 'Rusty Uncle Ate Apple Pie Carefully' — Remember, Understand, Apply, Analyze, Evaluate... wait — actually use: 'Really Useful Applications Analyze Every Creation' — Remember, Understand (U), Apply, Analyze, Evaluate, Create.
• The MOST TESTED FACT about Bloom's revision: CREATE is now the highest level, not Evaluate. Synthesis became Create and moved to position 6.
• Quick verb-to-level shortcut: Design/Compose/Construct = Create; Judge/Defend/Justify = Evaluate; Compare/Differentiate = Analyze; Solve/Compute/Use = Apply; Explain/Summarize = Understand; List/Name/Define = Remember.
• Scenario with 'original product' = Create. Scenario with 'judge against criteria' = Evaluate. This distinction appears on nearly every LET cycle.
• For affective items: a pupil who does the right thing CONSISTENTLY WITHOUT BEING REMINDED is at the CHARACTERIZING level (highest).

Key Points

• Learning outcomes fall into three domains: Cognitive (thinking), Affective (values and attitudes), and Psychomotor (physical skills). A complete lesson plan addresses all three relevant domains.
• Bloom's ORIGINAL taxonomy (1956) used nouns and ranked levels as: Knowledge, Comprehension, Application, Analysis, Synthesis, Evaluation.
• Anderson and Krathwohl's REVISED taxonomy (2001) uses VERBS and reorders the top two levels: Remember, Understand, Apply, Analyze, Evaluate, CREATE — with Create now at the highest level.
• The two critical changes in the revision: (1) Synthesis was renamed Create and moved to the TOP, and (2) Evaluation dropped to fifth, swapping ranks with the new Create.
• Bloom's revised levels from LOWEST to HIGHEST thinking: Remember → Understand → Apply → Analyze → Evaluate → Create.
• Krathwohl's affective taxonomy levels from lowest to highest: Receiving → Responding → Valuing → Organizing → Characterizing.
• Psychomotor domain (Dave's taxonomy, simplest): Imitation → Manipulation → Precision → Articulation → Naturalization.
• Psychomotor domain (Simpson's taxonomy): Perception → Set → Guided Response → Mechanism → Complex Overt Response → Adaptation → Origination.
• The shared logic across all taxonomies: learning progresses from simple, passive, or imitative behavior toward complex, autonomous, and generative performance.

Definitions

Section Title

Bloom's Revised Taxonomy: Cognitive, Affective, and Psychomotor Domains

Common Mistakes

• Using the ORIGINAL Bloom's order (Synthesis at 5, Evaluation at 6) on a question about the REVISED taxonomy — remember: in the revision, Create (formerly Synthesis) is now at the TOP (6), and Evaluate drops to 5.
• Confusing Evaluate and Analyze: Analyze = breaking apart; Evaluate = judging using criteria. A pupil who compares two stories is at Analyze; a pupil who argues which story is better and defends the choice is at Evaluate.
• Confusing Create and Apply: Apply uses an existing procedure; Create produces something genuinely new. Solving a given formula is Apply; designing a new formula is Create.
• Applying the original noun-based labels (Knowledge, Comprehension) when the question uses the revised verb-based labels — always check which version the item refers to.
• Thinking psychomotor objectives only matter for P.E. — MAPEH, Science experiments, HELE/TLE, and Arts all require psychomotor objectives in elementary school.

Exam Tips

• Match DepEd plan format to teacher experience: DLP = new/beginning teacher; DLL = experienced teacher. This is consistently tested on the LET.
• The 4A's are: Activity, Analysis, Abstraction, Application — in that exact order. Activity comes FIRST (experiential learning), not the lecture.
• In the 4A's, Abstraction is the stage where the teacher draws out the concept or principle — this is the closest stage to a formal lesson discussion.
• If a question asks 'In which part of the lesson plan does the teacher check if objectives were met?' — the answer is EVALUATION, not Assignment.
• Remember that lesson plan formats may change by DepEd order over time — on the LET, reason from PRINCIPLES (new teacher = more detail) rather than memorizing a specific order number.

Key Points

• A lesson plan is the teacher's blueprint for a single class session — it documents what to teach, how to teach it, what materials to use, and how to check if learning occurred.
• Good planning is the visible expression of the principle that teaching is goal-oriented.
• The five core parts of a Philippine lesson plan: (1) Objectives, (2) Subject Matter/Content, (3) Procedure/Learning Activities, (4) Evaluation/Assessment, (5) Assignment/Agreement.
• The 4A's instructional sequence widely used in Philippine classrooms: Activity → Analysis → Abstraction → Application.
• Older lesson plan formats use: Motivation/Preparation, Presentation, Discussion, Generalization, Application.
• DepEd recognizes three levels of planning: Detailed Lesson Plan (DLP), Semi-detailed Lesson Plan, and Daily Lesson Log (DLL).
• Newly hired or beginning teachers write DETAILED lesson plans; more experienced teachers may use the streamlined DAILY LESSON LOG (DLL).
• The DLL is a week-long logbook with sections for objectives, content, learning resources, procedures, remarks, and reflection.
• All teachers plan daily — only the LEVEL OF DETAIL changes with experience.

Definitions

Section Title

Lesson Planning: Parts, DepEd Formats, and the 4A's

Common Mistakes

• Confusing DLL with DLP: DLL = week-long log for experienced teachers; DLP = fully scripted single lesson for beginning teachers.
• Writing objectives in the lesson plan that describe TEACHER activity rather than learner outcomes (see Section 2 errors).
• Treating the Assignment part as optional — it is a formal component that either extends the current lesson or prepares for the next one.
• Skipping the Evaluation component or treating it as identical to the Assignment — Evaluation measures the lesson's objectives; Assignment extends learning beyond class time.
• Writing a lesson plan where the Evaluation does not match the objective's cognitive level — this is a constructive alignment violation (covered in the next section).

Exam Tips

• The ALIGNMENT TEST: Check if the VERB in the Objective, the VERB in the Activity, and the VERB in the Assessment are at the SAME Bloom's level. If they are not, the lesson is misaligned.
• LET scenario shortcut: If the objective says 'design' or 'create' (Create level) but the test only asks students to 'name' or 'list' (Remember level), the answer involves LACK OF CONSTRUCTIVE ALIGNMENT.
• Biggs's name is directly associated with constructive alignment — if the LET mentions 'Biggs,' the concept is constructive alignment.
• Performance-based assessment (portfolio, project, demonstration, role play) is appropriate for Apply, Analyze, Evaluate, and Create level objectives — not paper-and-pencil recall tests.

Key Points

• Constructive alignment, developed by John Biggs, is the principle that the three core elements of a lesson — intended learning outcomes, teaching and learning activities, and assessment tasks — must all target the SAME ability at the SAME cognitive level.
• Alignment check: Does the verb in the objective match the cognitive level of the activity AND the assessment? If yes, the lesson is aligned.
• Misalignment is the classic LET trap: a high-level objective (Create) tested with a low-level assessment (multiple-choice recall) is misaligned.
• To FIX misalignment: match the assessment verb and format to the objective verb and level, and choose activities that let learners PRACTICE exactly what the objective asks them to do.
• Example of aligned lesson: Objective — 'design a simple circuit model' (Create, Psychomotor); Activity — learners build and test circuits; Assessment — performance task where learners construct a working circuit.
• Example of misaligned lesson: Objective — 'construct a working circuit' (Create, Psychomotor); Assessment — written test asking learners to define electricity (Remember, Cognitive).
• Constructive alignment is the theoretical basis for DepEd's shift to performance-based and outcomes-based assessment in the K-12 curriculum.

Definitions

Section Title

Constructive Alignment: Connecting Objectives, Activities, and Assessment

Common Mistakes

• Writing a high-level objective (Evaluate, Create) but assessing only with a multiple-choice recall test — the most common alignment error in Philippine classrooms.
• Choosing activities that entertain learners but do not give them practice in the exact behavior stated in the objective.
• Confusing alignment with merely having all parts present in the lesson plan — a plan can have all five parts and still be misaligned if the levels do not match.
• Thinking that adding more activities automatically improves a lesson — alignment, not quantity, determines quality.