sustain:if:able kiwi

interactive engagement trumps content delivery: research

I’ve been thinking a lot recently about teaching and learning. It began when I re-worked a recent presentation and instead designed a set of interaction exercises. Most loved it, one resisted it.

Friday I head for New Zealand to deliver three keynote addresses. Expecting an audience of around 500, I was warned today that people will be expecting speakers not engagers. So to expect some resistance.

I follow on twitter a number of education lecturers in the UK and US. It’s a great way of keeping up to date with new research and thinking. An article on research in interactive engagement in University classes caught my eye today.

They researched an engineering class of 158 students by dividing the class into three.

A self-assessment group completed homework, involving ten self-assessment activities uploaded online. These included challenging narrative and multiple-choice questions that required them to create, explain, and carry out calculations. Immediate feedback was provided, reinforced by lecturer feedback during class.

A collaborative learning group participated in discussions to gain a broad understanding of the activity and to learn from one another. This involved a cycle of 10 minutes lecture, followed by students being given five minutes to solve a problem and receive feedback from the instructor. This group did not receive any homework.

A control group received traditional instruction, with content provided through a PowerPoint presentation plus homework.

The results showed that interactive engagement (self-assessment and collaborative learning) improved students academic performance. Engaging in such activities was found to encourage students’ participation, because the activities stimulate their critical thinking, demand interactions with other students, and lead to more deep learning.

They conclude this presents the following challenges for teachers and students:

“Instructors must meet the challenge of designing activities that will inspire students’ inquisitiveness, develop their sense of capability, and give them opportunities to share their ideas with other students through group discussions. They also should ensure that students have enough time to spend on the tasks. Equally, students need to play their part by improving their level of self-efficacy and self-regulation.”

So there’s an encouragement: Less time working on my powerpoint and more time in designing interactional activities. Accompanied by the need for participants to play their part!

(The full article, by Malefyane Tlhoaele, Adriaan Hofman, Koos Winnips & Yta Beetsma (2014) The impact of interactive engagement methods on students’ academic achievement, Higher Education Research & Development, 33:5, 1020-1034, is available here.)