Constructive Discomfort

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Constructive Discomfort

• Using an in-class communication system to
• (1) elicit prior conceptions and
• (2) provide formative assessment
• to both teachers and students.
• Steven D. Brewer
• Biology Computer Resource Center
• UMass Amherst

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Acknowledgements

• Students of Introductory Biology
• Elizabeth Connor
• Randy Phillis, Steve Goodwin, Bruce Jacobson,
  Larry Schwartz
• George Drake and the Morrill Science Center
  Technical Staff

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Failure is Just the Beginning...

• Related to me
• Related to our teaching methodology...
• Related to our course redesigns...

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Learning Goals

• Biology Department (1998)
• Three(?) phase process
• Identify goals (see handout)
• Organized as skills and perspectives
• Constructivist (student as co-constructor
  co-interpreter of biological knowledge)
• Encourage faculty to think about student activity
  in class
• Adjust Curriculum
• Assessment(?)

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Introductory Biology

• Traditional large lecture course
• Required by 9 Life Science majors
• 600-700 students (2 lecture sections)
• 2 faculty per section
• 3 50-minute lectures per week
• 4 machine scored multiple-choice exams
• Separate 3-hour lab per week

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Course Revisions

• Previous (failed) revisions
• Ordering content
• Learning Goals
• Laboratory
• Lecture
• In-Class Communication System ClassTalk
• Pew Course Redesign

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ClassTalk Pose Problem
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ClassTalk Student discussion and response
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ClassTalk Project results and facilitate class
discussion
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Wednesday, Nov 8, 2000
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If a protein has the following charge structure
in its amino acid side chains.... Which of
the following will be its conformation if the
protein folds in aqueous solution during while it
is being translated? 1. Structure 1.
2. Structure 2. 3. Each structure is equally
likely
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Kinds of Questions

• Questions to elicit student prior conceptions
• Questions that set-up new topics and ideas
• Intentionally fuzzy questions
• Questions that target alternate conceptions
• Progressions of questions that increase in
  complexity
• Practice exam questions

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Pew Course Redesign Project

• Preserve in-class communication system
• Use technology to save costs
• 2 --gt 1 instructors
• 3 --gt 2 lectures per week
• 4 --gt 3 exams
• Course Preparation Page
• Reading assignment
• Learning resources
• On-line quiz

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Pew Assessment

• Comparison of traditional lecture, ClassTalk
  lecture, and redesigned ClassTalk .
• Gather quantitative data on student performance
  from multiple sources
• Attendance, Exams, Laboratory, ClassTalk, Duck
• Gather qualitative data
• Surveys, Interviews, Observations of individuals
  and groups
• Identify relationships across experimental
  teaching environments between student outcomes
  and student characteristics

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Attendance
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Take-home Lesson

• Classtalk sections have better attendance (11,
  in this study)

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Classroom Behaviors
Number of events per 25 minute period
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Take-home Lesson

• Classtalk sections confront discuss more than
  100 questions in class during the semester.
• Students in the traditional section never put
  biological knowledge into their own words.

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Classroom Time Usage
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Time to First Question
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Class Discussion Length
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Take-home Lesson

• ClassTalk discussions represented a substantial
  investment of time (avg 21 minutes/class).
• ClassTalk has (at least) 2 modes
• Questions up front and/or regularly
• Lecture followed by question(s) at end
• Discussion following questions variable
• If strong agreement, move on quickly
• Discuss more following controversial questions

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Midsemester Evaluations
Please estimate how often you have spoken in
class (circle one)
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Midsemester Evaluations
Please describe two aspects of the course that
you feel are (1) contributing to your learning
and (2) that you would change to help you learn
better
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Take-home Lesson

• 50-60 unlikely to contribute to class
  discussion (though may be active in group
  discussions).
• Most students like ClassTalk.

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Student Comments
Traditional I feel during the lectures I dont
understand anything you are talking about. Need
to let students get involved and Explain in
better more simpler words. give us more
examples of test questions as we are being
lectured. The lectures are boring. Theres no
hands-on or interactive activities. The lectures
consist of the prof. Speaking and us taking notes
and thats it.
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Student Comments
Classtalk I hate to admit it, the
Classtalks help -- they actually force people to
think and apply the things that they have
read. While ClassTalk is good in theory, it is
time consuming. I wonder if the infrared system
is a possibility. I feel that being able to
discuss the answers to ClassTalk questions is
helpful. I am able to learn why the correct
answer is correct, and how the wrong answer plays
a role in the question, but is not exactly the
correct answer.
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Why do this?

• Students instructors like it
• Students like it as practice for the exam
• Directs students to focus on why items might be
  right or wrong

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Challenges

• Pace Coverage --gt Course Preparation page
• Quality Questions --gt Database to archive, index,
  share questions
• Learning Styles
• Group vs individual knowledge

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Fin