n professional education, learning by teaching (German: Lernen durch Lehren, short LdL) designates currently the method by Jean-Pol Martin that allows pupils and students to prepare and to teach lessons, or parts of lessons. Learning by teaching should not be confused with presentations or lectures by students, as students not only convey a certain content, but also choose their own methods and didactic approaches in teaching classmates that subject. Neither should it be confused with tutoring, because the teacher has intensive control of, and gives support for, the learning process in learning by teaching as against other methods.

History

Seneca the Younger told in his letters to Lucilius that we are learning if we teach (epistulae morales I, 7, 8): docendo discimus (lat.: "by teaching we are learning"). At all times in the history of schooling there have been phases where students were mobilized to teach their peers. Frequently, this was to reduce the number of teachers needed, so one teacher could instruct 200 students. However, since the end of the 19th century, a number of didactic-pedagogic reasons for student teaching have been put forward.

Students as teachers in order to spare teachers

In 1795 the Scotsman Andrew Bell[1] wrote a book about the mutual teaching method that he observed and used himself in Madras. The Londoner Joseph Lancaster picked up this idea and implemented it in his schools. This method was introduced 1815 in France in the "écoles mutuelles", because of the increasing number of students who had to be trained and the lack of teachers. After the French revolution of 1830, 2,000 "écoles mutuelles" were registered in France. Due to a political change in the French administration, the number of écoles mutuelles shrank rapidly and these schools were marginalized. It is important to stress that the learning level in the Bell-Lancaster-schools was very low. In hindsight, the low level can probably be attributed to the fact that the teaching-process was delegated entirely to the tutors and that the teachers did not supervise and support the teaching process.

Students as teachers in order to improve the learning-process

The first attempts using the learning by teaching method in order to improve learning were started at the end of the 19th century.
Selective descriptions and researches
Systematic research – though initially only descriptive – began in the middle of the 20th century. For instance Gartner 1971[2] in the US, in Germany Krüger 1975,[3] Wolfgang Steining 1985,[4] Udo Kettwig 1986,[5] Theodor F. Klassen 1988,[6] Ursula Drews 1997[7] and A. Renkl 1997[8]
LdL as a comprehensive method
The method received broader recognition starting in the early eighties, when Jean-Pol Martin developed the concept systematically for the teaching of French as a foreign language and gave it a theoretical background in numerous publications.[9] 1987 he founded a network of more than a thousand teachers that employed learning by teaching (the specifical name: LdL = "Lernen durch Lehren") in many different subjects, documented its successes and approaches and presented their findings in various teacher training sessions.[10] From 2001 on LdL has gained more and more supporters as a result of educational reform movements started throughout Germany.

Learning by teaching by Martin (LdL)

LdL by Martin consists of two components: a general anthropological one and a subject-related one.

• The anthropological basis of LdL is related to the pyramid or hierarchy of needs introduced by Abraham Maslow, which consists, from base to peak, of 1) physiological needs, 2) safety/security, 3) social/love/belonging, 4) esteem/self-confidence and 5) being/growth through self-actualization and self-transcendence. Personal growth moves upward through hierarchy, whereas regressive forces tend to push downward. The act of successful learning, preparation and teaching of others contributes to items 3 through 5 above. Facing the problems of our world today and in the future, it is essential to mobilize as many intellectual resources as possible, which happens in LdL lessons in a special way. Democratic skills are promoted through the communication and socialization necessary for this shared discovery and construction of knowledge.

• The subject related component (in foreign language teaching) of LdL aims to negate the alleged contradiction between the three main components: automatization of speech-related behavior, teaching of cognitively internalized contents and authentic interaction/communication.

The LdL approach

After intensive preparation by the teacher, students become responsible for their own learning and teaching. The new material is divided into small units and student groups of not more than three people are formed. Each group familiarizes itself with a strictly defined area of new material and gets the assignment to teach the whole group in this area. One important aspect is that LdL should not be confused with a student-as-teacher-centered method. The material should be worked on didactically and methodologically (impulses, social forms, summarizing phases etc.). The teaching students have to make sure their audience has understood their message/topic/grammar points and therefore use different means to do so (e.g. short phases of group or partner exercises, comprehension questions, quizzes etc.).

Building neural network

Martin attempted to transfer the brain structure, especially the operating model from neural networks – to classroom interactions.[11] The activities conducted during the various lessons phases and their consequences are summarized in the following table:[12]

Advantages and disadvantages

Most teachers using the method do not apply it in all their classes or all the time. They state the following advantages and disadvantages:

• Student work is more motivated, efficient, active and intensive due to lowered inhibitions and an increased sense of purpose
• By eliminating the class division of authoritative teacher and passive audience, an emotive solidarity is obtained.
• Students may perform many routine tasks, otherwise unnecessarily carried out by the instructor
• Next to subject-related knowledge students gain important key qualifications like
  • teamwork
  • planning abilities
  • reliability
  • presentation and moderation skills
  • self-confidence

• The introduction of the method requires a lot of time.
• Students and teachers have to work more than usual.
• There is a danger of simple duplication, repetition or monotony if the teacher does not provide periodic didactic impetus.

Reception of Martin's methods

Martin's work has been well received in teacher training and by practicing teachers: since 1985 more than 100 teacher students in all subjects wrote their ending thesis about LdL. Also the education administration received both the theory and the practice of LdL (vgl.Margret Ruep 1999[13]). In didactics handbooks LdL has been described as an "extreme form of learner centred teaching"[14]). On the university level, LdL has been disseminated by Joachim Grzega in Germany, Guido Öbel [15] in Japan and Alina Rachimova [16] in Russia.

Learning by teaching outside the LdL-context

Sudbury schools

Sudbury schools, since 1968, do not segregate students by age, so that students of any age are free to interact with students in other age groups. One effect of this age mixing is that a great deal of the teaching in the school is done by students. Here are some statements about Learning by teaching in the Sudbury Schools:[17]

Pupil-Team Learning: The Durrell Studies

In the 1950s Dr. Donald D. Durrell and his colleagues at Boston University pursued similar methods which they named Pupil-Team Learning. A year-long efficacy study in the schools of Dedham, Massachusetts, was published in the Boston University Journal of Education, Vol. 142, December, 1959, entitled "Adapting Instruction to the Learning Needs of Children in the Intermediate Grades" in which one of the authors, Walter J. McHugh, reported significant learning gains from the use of pupil teams.

The Vygotsky Connection

In the 1930s Lev Vygotsky wrote extensively, in Russian, on the profound connection between language and cognition, and in particular oral language (speech) and learning. The implication of Vygotsky's observations for Learning by Teaching would appear to be direct and apt. "The one who does the talking, does the learning" may best summarize the point: students learn by teaching their peers.