From how people learn to deliberate practice to the development of expertise, we see repeatedly that instruction must be student-centered (though not just any old in-class activity will do.)
Research by Hake (1998) and Prather et al. (2009) (this is where the learning gain vs. interaction data come from) show that in order for students to achieve even modest learning gains, students should be actively engaging with the content — building their own understanding — at least 25% of the class time. In other words, you can still lecture for 75% of the class. It’s what you do in that 25% that makes all the difference.
In our next session, we’ll look at alternatives to lecture you can use to make your classroom active, including
- think-pair-share
- showing video
- What do you notice? What do you wonder?
- portable whiteboards
- in-class discussions
- peer instruction with clickers (covered in depth again, later)
- and more…
Tasks to complete before class
- In May, 2014, a very important paper was published by Scott Freeman et al. in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (PNAS). The researchers did a massive meta-analysis of education research papers that studied the impact of active learning on students performance. I found the paper difficult to read because I don’t properly understand the statistics (oops, that’s rather fixed of me, isn’t it?) You’re welcome to read it but you’re not required to. Instead, please
- Read this terrific summary of the Freeman et al. paper by Aatish Bhatia
- Read this short commentary by Carl Wieman about the Freeman paper
- I hesitate to assign this next reading because I don’t want to reinforce any alternate conceptions you might have about the importance of active learning. But everyone is talking about Molly Worthen’s Op-Ed “Lecture Me. Really.” New York Times on October 17, 2015. As educators developing your expertise, you should be aware of this conversation so you can contribute when your colleagues bring it up. For what you can add to the conversation, see task 3.
- Please read this excellent rebuttal to Worthen, written by Josh Eyler, Director of The Center for Teaching Excellence and Adj. Assoc. Professor of Humanities at Rice University: “Active Learning Is Not Our Enemy.” Josh addresses many of Worthen’s points using evidence, including the Freeman et al. paper.
- Active learning takes time. Where does that time come from? From “flipping the class” by giving students their first exposure to new material (and learning the easy stuff) BEFORE class. This way, they arrive in class prepared to engage in the more difficult, conceptually-challenging concepts with opportunities for practice and timely, formative feedback from peers, TAs, and instructor. My friend, Derek Bruff, just recorded an interview called “Flipping Out” for the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast. Derek talks a lot about using the pre-class activities to stir up the students’ curiosity so they’re be motivated to engage in class. It’s about an hour long but it’s a great listen.
- If you’re on Twitter, think about following @joshua_r_eyler, @derekbruff, and even me, @polarisdotca. The teaching and learning community on Twitter is rich, wide-ranging, and generous.
Resources from the Meeting
- If you’re interested in how education research gets done, I recommend Improved Learning in a Large-Enrollment Physics Class by Deslauriers, Schelew and Wieman (2011), my colleagues in the Carl Wieman Science Education Initiative at the Univ. of British Columbia. This research took place in a physics class but don’t let that suggest it can’t occur elsewhere.
Here are the slides we used in class:
