Many faculty interviewed regarded this as the most important element of good teaching. Effective teachers require students to use critical thinking skills. Effective teachers have high expectations for student learning. They encourage students by setting challenging but achievable goals and by showing respect for students and their opinions and abilities. Effective teachers are able to perceive numerous student misconceptions, and teach in a manner as to minimize these.
Effective teachers maintain a degree of humility.
As one put it, they take their subjects seriously but not themselves. Many adopt the role of fellow-learners with their students. Assessment of Student Performance Effective teachers create discipline-specific tests and exams that require an appropriate level of mastery of the subject matter. These and other measures of learning require students to think critically and creatively about the course content rather than display mere memory of facts and concepts. Thus a good test, exam, or other evaluation can itself be a teaching device.