INSTRUCTIONAL TECHNOLOGY 3(2+1)

Lesson 5 : Classification Of Extension Teaching Methods

Introduction

To help people to help themselves is the theme lying at the core of India’s National Extension Service. This is the criterion that founders and current leaders of the movement suggest against which its success must be judged. Helping people learn to help themselves requires education. Education requires learning. Learning requires teaching to make it effective. Teaching requires special aptitudes on the part of teachers. For community development workers, these skills include knowledge of technology or what to teach, an understanding of the educational process or how to teach, skill with extension teaching methods, and ability to work with village people.

The great task of Extension Education is to exert a desirable controlling influence over others through the use of the power of education. The essential function of the extension agent or lay leader in his effort to promote learning among others is to create situations that provide people with an opportunity to learn stimulate the mental and physical activity that produces the desired learning.

The task is accomplished through the skillful use of extension teaching methods and application of the sound principles of teaching and learning.