Stevick highlights the five basic principles that underlie this method:
1. Teaching should be subordinated to learning.
2. Learning is not just imitation or exercise.
3. By learning, the mind is furnished by his own work, trial and error, experimentation, deliberate, suspension of trials and review conclusions.
4. While working, the mind turns to all what has been acquired, mainly their experience in learning the native language.
5. Whether to make the work of the teacher to the learner, the teacher should stop interfering and let go of their work.