Category Archives: Active Learning

2013 GSI Symposium Breakout Session 1: Practical Tips for Active Learning

Posted on by
Reply

A Report from the Trenches

The next several posts will be in the form of reports from the JHU Gateway Sciences Initiative (GSI) 2nd Annual Symposium on Excellence in Teaching and Learning in the Sciences. The symposium featured five breakout sessions and many of us attending wished we could clone ourselves and attend more than one, as the topics were so interesting. So to those who couldn’t bilocate, and to those who couldn’t attend the symposium, these posts are for you.

First up is “Moving from Lecture-based Teaching to Active Learning Instructional Approaches: Some Practical Tips” facilitated by Robin Wright, PhD, Associate Dean and Professor of Biology, University of Minnesota.

Robin Wright practiced what she preaches in this breakout session, quickly moving the participants into an active learning activity.

Engaging in active learning discussion.To begin she told faculty to “…start where you are, you don’t need to start over. Start with your current lecture notes and identify the key learning outcomes. What can you do instead of telling your students?” (Remember that the one who does the work does the learning. When you tell your students, you are doing the work.)

She asked participants to think about their favorite lecture, or their worst one. She then discussed the principle of backward design – an instructor looks at what s/he wants students to know and/or be able to do at the end of the course.  Dr. Wright noted that the advantage of backward design is by starting with defining the desired end result, instructors can create appropriate assessments and activities. As well, students can be told what they can expect to learn. Setting clear expectations helps students achieve the goals set for them.

She then asked everyone to define a learning outcome and design an assessment to determine how well students reached the outcome, directing three questions to the participants:

  1. What do you want students to know or be able to do [think in terms of the lecture you’ve selected – what do you want the students to learn from that lecture]?
  2. How will you assess their learning?
  3. What activities will you plan to help them reach your specific goals?

Dr. Wright walked the participants through an example from her own class, defined the outcome, described activities that moved students from a lower level  to a higher level (Bloom’s Taxonomy) with activities, and described how assessed.

Then the participants were set to work on writing one higher level learning outcome and an appropriate assessment and discussing these with the people sitting near them. Everyone appeared to be very enthusiastic about this exercise. In sharing after the small group exchanges we heard the following comments:

It was difficult for many to get started.
It was a powerful tool for determining what the class should focus on.
Participants refined their learning outcomes and assessments in discussion with others.

Dr. Wright then talked about the “tools in her toolkit” that she uses as activities and gave examples of some of these:

  1. Figures from the textbook projected and used as a basis for questions for small group discussion.
  2. Trick questions (questions which may seem to have an obvious answer, but the “obvious answer” is not the correct one).
  3. Videos used to challenge thinking and promote discussion, often used as a way to introduce broad subjects (e.g., evolution) to her classes.
  4. Case studies used to get students to think critically and to begin to learn on their own, outside of the classroom.

She introduced each “tool” with a specific example, and had participants briefly discuss possible answers to questions she would ask her students. Again, the participants gained an understanding of how to incorporate active learning into the classroom through an active learning process.

View the video of Robin Wright’s 2013 GSI Symposium keynote address “Teach What Really Matters; Use What Really Works.” 

Macie Hall, Senior Instructional Designer
Center for Educational Resources

Image Source: Microsoft clip art

Flipping Your Class

Posted on by
5

At the 2nd Annual Johns Hopkins University Symposium on Excellence in Teaching and Learning in the Sciences, we heard a lot about flipping the classroom.

From lecture hall to interactive learning - two images with arrow connecting.

The term, flipped classroom, might bring to mind an anti-gravity experiment, but it actually refers to a different way of thinking about teaching and learning. In a traditional pedagogical model, a faculty member is a “sage on the stage,” lecturing to students (who are frantically taking notes in an effort to capture all of the professor’s pearls of wisdom).  Assignments – readings, problem sets, projects, papers – are all done outside of class, often with little or no direct guidance from faculty.

In the flipped classroom (also called the inverted classroom), the process is turned around. Instead of doing problem-based homework outside of class and coming to class to hear the professor lecture, the student watches a version of the lecture content online, and comes to class to work on problems in an interactive, collaborative setting. The faculty member becomes a “guide on the side” or a coach, perhaps injecting a mini-lecture when needed to help students struggling with a common problem.  The focus shifts from teaching to learning.

This is not an “either/or” or an “instead of” situation. Students view the online content at their convenience, do the assigned readings, AND come to class.  They must come to class because that’s where the active learning will happen, where they are going to work on problems individually or in groups, and perhaps most importantly, where they will develop skills that will enable them to be life-long learners, not only in the discipline that you teach, but in any subject. Some professors choose to insert quick (graded) quizzes at the start of the flipped class as a further inducement to attendance.

Two high school teachers, Aaron Sams and Jonathan Bergmann, are credited with developing the model for the flipped classroom in 2007. Sams was awarded the 2009 Presidential Award for Excellence in Math and Science Teaching, and he and his colleague have written extensively about this model and its evolution. See the blog post The Flipped Class: Shedding Light on the Confusion, Critique, and Hype; an article available as a PDF for JHU affiliates, Before You Flip, Consider This; and their book, Flip Your Classroom: Reach Every Student in Every Class Every Day.

One quote from the blog post describes the classroom scene and is particularly compelling:

As we roam around the class, we notice the students developing their own collaborative groups.  Students are helping each other learn instead of relying on the teacher as the sole disseminator of knowledge.

One of the greatest benefits of flipping is that overall interaction increases: teacher to student and student to student.  Since the role of the teacher has changed from presenter of content to learning coach, we spend our time talking to kids.  We are answering questions, working with small groups, and guiding the learning of each student individually.

When students are working on an assignment and we notice a group of students who are struggling with the same thing, we automatically organize the students into a tutorial group.  We often conduct mini-lectures with groups of students who are struggling with the same content. The beauty of these mini-lectures is we are delivering “just in time” instruction when the students are ready for learning.

Changing the focus in the classroom from the faculty teaching to the students actively learning may prove to be challenging to the instructor used to actively teaching. Terry Doyle, a professor and author of two books on learner centered teaching, tells us, “It’s the one who does the work who does the learning.” [Helping Students Learn in a Learner Center Environment: A Guide to Teaching in Higher Education, Stylus, 2008, p. 25].

Robert Talbert, who teaches mathematics at Grand Valley State University in Michigan and writes for The Chronicle of Higher Education, has posted about his experiences with flipping his classroom on his blog, Casting Out Nines. His posts speak honestly about his experiences including receiving pushback from some students. One of his recent pieces, We Need to Produce Learners, Not Just Students, looks at the concept of producing life-long learners mentioned above.

On the practical side, there are DIY guides. Julie Schell, a post-doc working with Eric Mazur – the Harvard University physics professor who developed Peer Instruction, a research-based, interactive teaching method – has created a Quick Start Guide to Flipping your Classroom with Peer Instruction. Closer to home, JHU Associate Professor of Materials Science and Engineering, Michael Falk, has been flipping his classroom since 2010. In an article for the Innovative Instructor Pedagogy Forum entitled Lectures on Demand, he outlines the technology solutions he has used to produce the video content.

Faculty writing about the applied components of the flipped classroom agree that using shorter, topic-focused videos for the out of class content is more effective than video-taping their traditional 50 minute (or longer) lectures. As was discussed in our post on micro-lectures, students’ attention begins to wander after 10 minutes. Professor Falk notes in his article that creating the online content requires thought and up-front time, but pays off later, as this content can be reused in subsequent offerings of the course. Faculty can use video-recordings of themselves explaining key concepts or problems, borrow from Khan Academy or similar materials available on YouTube educational channels, offer animations or other didactic resources.

Faculty who have made the flip are enthusiastic about the benefits for their students. After the discussions at the GSI Symposium, we hope to see more flipping at JHU.

Macie Hall, Senior Instructional Designer
Center for Educational Resources

Image Source: Microsoft clip art edited by Macie Hall

Microlectures

Posted on by
Reply

You may have heard some buzz recently about microlectures or mini-lectures. Here’s The Innovative Instructor’s scoop on the topic.

Microlectures are just what they sound like – short, focused discourses on specific topics. If you’ve ever watched a TED talk, you’ve experienced a microlecture. The classic TED talk is 18 minutes or shorter, and the speaker concentrates on developing a single big idea.  Another example of the microlecture can be found in the Khan Academy model. The Khan Academy website boasts a library of videos covering “…K-12 math, science topics such as biology, chemistry, and physics, and …humanities with playlists on finance and history. Each video is a digestible chunk, approximately 10 minutes long, and especially purposed for viewing on the computer.”

Students in class room raising hands.

What does this have to do with you and your teaching approach? Research has shown that a student’s attention span during lectures decreases after fifteen minutes [Wankat, P., The Effective Efficient Professor: Teaching, Scholarship and Service, Allyn and Bacon: Boston, MA, 2002]. Once you lecture past that time, students retain significantly less information. [Hartley, J., and Davies, I., “Note Taking: A Critical Review,” Programmed Learning and Educational Technology, 1978, Vol. 15, pp. 207–224.] Hartley and Davies suggested that breaking up a lecture into smaller segments could help keep students engaged.

One way to integrate microlectures into your face-to-face teaching is to intersperse short periods of lecturing  with active learning activities. These exercises will reinforce the material you’ve just presented.

Even if you have a large enrollment for your course, it is possible to implement active learning strategies. A quick method is “Pair-Share.” After presenting in a microlecture format, have your students pair off and discuss a question you pose to test their comprehension of the material just covered. Eric Mazur, Professor of Physics and Applied Physics, School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Harvard University, has written and presented (see his talk, Confessions of a Converted Lecturer, from the JHU Gateway Sciences Initiative 2012 Symposium on Teaching Excellence in the Sciences) on using active learning, and pair-share exercises, in large courses.

The Educause Learning Initiative recently published a short tip sheet on microlectures that are recorded for students to use outside of the classroom: 7 Things You Should Know about Microlectures.  This two page PDF document addresses recording microlectures for hybrid or “flipped” class settings (where the recorded lecture is viewed by students outside of regular class time), but contains advice that will be useful in fully face-to-face learning environments as well.

If you are interested in learning more about active learning strategies and how you can integrate these into your teaching, perhaps in conjunction with microlectures, you can get a jump start by reading the article, Active Learning: An Introduction [Felder, R.M. and Brent, R., 2009, ASQ Higher Education Brief, 2(4), 1-5].  This is an introduction to active learning that includes frequently asked questions about what you can do and what you can get your students to do.

Macie Hall, Senior Instructional Designer
Center for Educational Resources

Image Source: Microsoft Clip Art

Select Web Resources on Active Learning Strategies in the Sciences

Posted on by
Reply

Students in classroomSTEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) education is very much on the radar screen here at Johns Hopkins. Last year our Provost launched the Gateway Sciences Initiative (GSI) as a “…multi-dimensional program to improve and enrich learning of gateway sciences at Johns Hopkins University for undergraduate and graduate students.” Active learning strategies have been a big part of the ensuing conversation. Following are some web resources that will be useful for faculty interested in finding out more about how to incorporate active learning activities into their teaching.

Team-Based Learning Collaborative
http://www.teambasedlearning.org

The Team-Based Learning Collaborative (TBLC) is a consortium of university educators dedicated to supporting faculty from a variety of disciplines who wish to implement team-based learning. The website has specific guidelines, how-to videos, and step by step instructions created by faculty for faculty.

Yale Center for Scientific Teaching
http://www.yale.edu/cst/

The goal of the Center for Scientific Teaching is to enhance undergraduate biology education by training a new generation of “scientific teachers,” namely faculty and instructors who bring the rigor and spirit of science research to teaching. The website has instructional modules developed by faculty who teach undergraduate and graduate science courses and a bi bibliography.

MIT Technology Enhanced Active Learning (TEAL)
 http://web.mit.edu/edtech/casestudies/teal.html

TEAL is an initiative to transform university education from a string of passive lectures in introductory courses into an intense, active, personalized and highly collaborative adventure. The central concepts are flexible modes of learning that better stimulate discovery and improve understanding of conceptual material. The website provides an overview to the activities and spaces in use at MIT and is useful as a model for active learning initiatives.

Stanford Center for Innovations in Learning
http://wallenberg.stanford.edu/

Wallenberg Hall is Stanford University’s center for research in classroom teaching and learning. This site provides a model for active learning with descriptions of the facility, case studies of how the rooms are used, and case studies and interviews with faculty talking about their classroom experiences. Of particular interest are the papers, presentations, and information about on-going research in teaching and learning found here: http://wallenberg.stanford.edu/teaching/findings.html

NC State University Student-Centered Active Learning Environment for Undergraduate Programs (SCALE-UP)
http://www.ncsu.edu/PER/scaleup.html

The primary goal of the Student-Centered Active Learning Environment for Undergraduate Programs (SCALE-UP) Project is to establish highly collaborative, hands-on, computer-rich, interactive learning environments for large-enrollment courses. The website showcases the SCALE-UP spaces at North Carolina State University and other institutions that have adopted SCALE-UP.  Also available through the website: links to physics learning activities, research in physics education, software products to enrich visualization in physics classes, assessment resources, and student learning toolkits.

Minnesota – Active Learning Classrooms
http://www1.umn.edu/ohr/teachlearn/alc/index.html

The University of Minnesota has invested in a new Active Learning Classrooms building and has developed these web resource pages to outline the considerations and challenges in adopting active learning methods, and to provide faculty with specific strategies and activities to promote successful active learning course design.

University of Washington Physics Education Group
Tutorials in Introductory Physics
http://www.phys.washington.edu/groups/peg/curric.html

Two major curriculum developments are the subject of publications by the Physics Education Group at UW.  Physics by Inquiry is a set of lab-based modules designed for K-12 teachers and for college students whose science background is weak. Tutorials in Introductory Physics is intended for use by small groups of students working collaboratively as a supplementary curriculum to aid in the development and application of key concepts in calculus or algebra-based physics.

Carl Wieman Science Education Initiative at the University of British Columbia (CWSEI)
http://www.cwsei.ubc.ca/index.html

The goal of the CWSEI is to achieve highly effective, evidence-based science education for all post-secondary students by applying the latest advances in pedagogical and organizational excellence. This website has a number of useful resources applicable for STEM teaching. Of particular interest are:

Clicker Resources, which include an instructor’s guide: http://www.cwsei.ubc.ca/resources/clickers.htm and videos that show the benefits of, and offer practical tips on, using clickers in the classroom: http://www.cwsei.ubc.ca/resources/SEI_video.html

Educause 
http://www.educause.edu/EDUCAUSE+Review/EDUCAUSEReviewMagazineVolume40/LearningSpaceDesigninAction/157996

EDUCAUSE Review Magazine, Volume 40, Number 4, July/August 2005 has several articles on learning space design theories, principles, and practices, including details on active learning initiatives and activity-based science courses at MIT, NC State University, University of Washington, and Dickinson College, among others.

Association of American Universities (AAU) Undergraduate STEM Education Initiative
http://www.aau.edu/policy/article.aspx?id=12588

The Association of American Universities (AAU) announced on September 14, 2011, that it would undertake a five-year initiative to improve the quality of undergraduate teaching and learning in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields at its member institutions. The goals of the initiative are to help institutions assess the quality of STEM teaching on their campuses, share best practices, and create incentives for their departments and faculty members to adopt the most effective teaching methods in their classes.

Macie Hall, Senior Instructional Designer
Center for Educational Resources

Image source: Microsoft Clip Art

Quick Tips: Using Case Studies

Posted on by
2

Sometimes we see a link to a resource or hear of a teaching solution that we want to share. The Innovative Instructor provides the perfect place for this. In our Quick Tips you’ll be getting “Just the facts, ma’am.” Or sir, as the case may be.

Students in discussionOne of our CER colleagues, Mike Reese came across a link to a great online resource for case studies (also called case reports), the National Center for Case Study Teaching in Science (NCCSTS).

From the NCCSTS website. “[Case studies] can be used not only to teach scientific concepts and content, but also process skills and critical thinking.  And since many of the best cases are based on contemporary, and often contentious, science problems that students encounter in the news, the use of cases in the classroom makes science relevant.” (http://sciencecases.lib.buffalo.edu/cs/about/)

If you want to know more about case studies and the value they can provide in your teaching, the Colorado State University Writing Guide to Case Studies is a good place to start.

Macie Hall, Senior Instructional Designer
Center for Educational Resources

Image Source: Microsoft Clip Art

What’s New with Clickers?

Posted on by
Reply

There’s a new clicker on the quad this fall.  Clicker is the popular term for the devices used for in-class voting systems. The Homewood campus is now using the i>Clicker Classroom Response System; students can use the same clicker device in multiple courses. One of the benefits of the i>Clicker system is that it is integrated with the Blackboard course management system.

Faculty need a computer, either their own laptop or the podium computer in a smart classroom, to use clickers during class. Students simply purchase and register an i>Clicker voting unit. For the Krieger School of Arts & Sciences and the Whiting School of Engineering, the Center for Educational Resources (CER) will provide the i>Clicker software and an RF receiver if needed. Interested faculty can borrow a loaner i>Clicker system to try out in a class up to 50 students. For other JHU schools, contact your divisional instructional support center for information.

Photograph of an i>clicker2

In-class voting technologies were first piloted in classes on the Homewood campus in spring 2003. Since then in-class voting has become ubiquitous in large enrollment classes at Homewood; over 2500 students per semester use the system. Clickers are used in courses such as biology, chemistry, civil engineering, earth and planetary sciences, history of science and technology, materials science, physics, and psychological and brain sciences.

Clickers allow faculty to engage students quickly and easily. They enable faculty to:

  • Give and grade objective pop quizzes on readings or other assignments
  • Conduct in-class polls in real time
  • Stimulate class discussion by posing subjective questions, using either ad-hoc or previously developed questions
  • Manage, record and run reports on all aspects of students’ performance using the system
  • Take attendance

In a typical example, an instructor poses a question, often multiple-choice, to the class. Then students think about the question and submit their responses using their handheld wireless transmitters (clickers). Responses are beamed to a receiver plugged into the instructor’s computer. Software on the computer processes the information quickly and displays a bar chart showing the distribution of student responses. Instructors can then use these responses to decide how to proceed in the class.

Opinions vary on whether or not to use clickers for grading class attendance. Some instructors simply use clicker votes to count as participation points, just as they might grade students in discussions. For instructors who would like to monitor attendance over time, clickers can record attendance.

Instructors have found that using clickers has dramatically increased attendance in class, enhanced just-in-time teaching capabilities, increased classroom participation and simplified the deployment and grading of quizzes and exams. Data collected over several years in several courses show a direct correlation between clicker participation and final grades. Clickers are generally considered to be one of the foundations of an active learning classroom.

Faculty who are interested in learning more about the in-class voting system should
contact Brian Cole (bcole@jhu.edu, 410-516-5418) or drop in to the Center for Educational Resources on Q Level in the Milton S.Eisenhower Library.

Clicker Resources

Richard Shingles, Lecturer, Department of Biology
Direcctor of the TA Training Institute, Center for Educational Resources

Image source: Photograph © Brian Cole

 

Teaching Tips: Classroom Assessment

Posted on by
3

Increasing emphasis is being placed on assessment, and many faculty are looking for evaluation practices that extend beyond giving a mid-term and final exam. In particular the concept of non-graded classroom assessment is gaining traction. In their book Classroom Assessment Techniques, Thomas Angelo and Patricia Cross (Jossey-Bass, 1993) stress the importance of student evaluation that is “learner-centered, teacher-directed, mutually beneficial, formative, context-specific, ongoing, and firmly rooted in good practice.”

Students in a classroom.

While the authors describe in detail numerous techniques for ascertaining in a timely manner whether or not students are learning what is being taught, here are several quick and easy to implement methods:

 

The Minute Paper: At an appropriate break, ask students to answer on paper a specific question pertaining to what has just been taught. After a minute or two, collect the papers for review after class, or, to promote class interaction, ask students to pair off and discuss their responses. After a few minutes, call on a few students to report their answers and results of discussion. If papers are turned in, there is value to both the anonymous and the signed approach. Grading, however, is not the point; this is a way to gather information about the effectiveness of teaching and learning.

In Class Survey: Think of this as a short, non-graded pop quiz. Pass out a prepared set of questions, or have students provide answers on their own paper to questions on a PowerPoint/Keynote slide. Focus on a few key concepts. Again, the idea is to assess whether students understand what is being taught.

Exit Ticket: Select one of the following items and near the end of class ask your students to write on a sheet of paper 1) a question they have that didn’t get answered, 2) a concept or problem that they didn’t understand, 3) a bullet list of the major points covered in class, or 4) a specific question to access their learning. Students must hand in the paper to exit class. Allow anonymous response so that students will answer honestly. If you do this regularly, you may want to put the exit ticket question on your final PowerPoint/Keynote slide.

Tools that can help with assessment

Classroom polling devices (a.k.a. clickers) offer an excellent means of obtaining evidence of student learning. See http://www.cer.jhu.edu/clickers.html for information about the in-class voting system used at JHU. Faculty who are interested in learning more should contact Brian Cole in the CER.

Faculty at the JHU School of Nursing have been piloting an online application called Course Canary to obtain student assessment data. Formative course evaluation surveys allow faculty to collect student feedback quickly and anonymously. A free account is available (offering two online surveys and two exit ticket surveys) at: https://coursecanary.com/.

Macie Hall, Senior Instructional Designer
Center for Educational Resources

Image source: Microsoft Clip Art