Workshop jointly with the Engineering Subject Centre Improving the student experience of learning el

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Workshop jointly with the Engineering Subject
CentreImproving the student experience of
learning electronics
Noel Entwistle, Jennifer Nisbet, and Adrian
Bromage Edinburgh and Coventry
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Outline of the workshop

• Introduce the project as a whole
• Explain the concepts being used
• Describe EEE settings and data collection
• Explain the analyses and present findings
• Consider the relevance and implications

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TLRP programme objectivesESRC Teaching and
Learning Research Programme

• Enhancing learning outcomes engagement
• Developing research collaborating with users
• Achieving synergy across disciplines stages
• Transforming theoretical knowledge for users
• Producing findings valuable for practitioners

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Research objectives and processes

• Work with colleagues in five subject areas to
  explore teaching and learning in their discipline
• Explore how teaching-learning environments in
  each subject area help or hinder student
  understanding
• Use the interplay between quantitative and
  qualitative methods to build up evidence on the
  effects of teaching on learning
• Investigate ways of encouraging university
  teachers to enhance their teaching through
  carefully designed, detailed feedback from
  students

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Main phases of the project

• Phase 1
• Reviews of the literature, development of
  questionnaires, analysis of national teaching
  quality reports, telephone interviews with staff
  in excellent departments
• Phase 2
• First year group - identify departments and
  course units, interview staff, collect
  questionnaire data at start and end of course
  units analyse these baseline data, report back
  to course teams, suggest and negotiate
  collaborative initiatives
• Following year group - repeat data collection,
  analyse data and compare with previous year
  group, report back to course team, discuss the
  effects of the collaborative initiative
• Phase 3
• Prepare reports and communicate findings in
  various ways designed for each of the main
  audiences of users

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Phase 1 analyses of
teaching-learning environments

• Teaching quality reports of 12 departments in
  each subject area and telephone interviews with
  staff in 6 of those departments were found to
  differ systematically in the following aspects
• Administrative
• Research
• Professional
• Teaching
• Student support
• And student characteristics suggesting aspects
  of alignment
• Entry qualifications, knowledge and skills at
  entry, work experience, age, gender, ethnic and
  home background, student sub-culture

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Main concepts within Phase 2

• Teaching-learning environment
• Constructive alignment
• Ways of thinking practising in the subject
• Students approaches to studying
• Students experiences and perceptions of the
  teaching-learning environment

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Constructive alignment

• A good teaching system aligns teaching method
  and assessment to the learning activities stated
  in the objectives, so that all aspects of this
  system act in accord to support appropriate
  learning. This system is called constructive
  alignment, based as it is on the twin principles
  of constructivism in learning and alignment in
  teaching.
• John Biggs (2003, p. 11)

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Ways of thinking and practising in the subject
(WTP)

• The richness, depth and breadth of what students
  might learn through engagement with a given
  subject area in a specific context. This might
  include, for example, coming to terms with
  particular understandings, forms of discourse,
  values or ways of acting which are regarded as
  central to graduate-level mastery of a discipline
  or subject area
• McCune Hounsell (2005)

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Approaches to learning and studying

• Deep approach- understand for yourself
• Surface approach- complete required work
• Organised studying and time-management
• Effort and concentration

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Experiences and perceptions of the
teaching-learning environment

• Clear aims and well-organised course unit
• Teaching focusing on understanding WTP
• Set work and feedback supporting WTP
• Staff enthusiasm and support
• Support from other students
• Interest and enjoyment

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Main components of Phase 2 data

• Documents describing the course unit and
  materials made available to students
• Discussions and interviews with members of
  course team transcribed or recorded in notes
• Questionnaires completed by students at start
  and end of each selected course unit Learning
  and Studying Questionnaire -SLQ Experiences
  of Teaching and Learning Questionnaire - ETLQ
• Interviews with small groups of students about
  their experiences of teaching

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Electronic engineering settings

• Ancient research-intensive university
• Analogue units in second and fourth year
• Technological research-intensive university
• Analogue in second, third and fourth years
• Post-1992 university
• Analogue taught in the final year
• Technology college
• Introduction to microprocessors

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Strategy for integrating findings

• Build up evidence from a variety of sources to
  reach conclusions, in much the same way as a
  barrister builds up a case in court
• Establish the main type of ways of thinking and
  practising being encouraged in the course
  units from literature, Phase 1, and
  interviews with staff students
• Consider the extent to which different
  teaching-learning environments were seen by
  students as supporting their learning
  effectively from questionnaires, and
  interviews with students and staff
• Evaluate the perceived effects of the
  collaborative initiatives to explore effective
  pedagogy within the subject area from
  questionnaires, and interviews with students and
  staff

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Ways of thinking in analogue electronics

• Appreciating the overall function of a circuit
• Recognising the crucial groups of components
• Seeing how to set about analysing different
  circuits
• Having the necessary analytic tools for
  solutions
• Developing a memory bank of contrasting examples
• Thinking intuitively in designing new circuits

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Strategy for looking at student learning

• Analyse relationships between questionnaire
  scales
• Compare the means of scales for course units
• Analyse the responses to individual items
• Analyse the interview transcripts for further
  evidence
• Report findings to teaching staff and discuss
• Devise a collaborative initiative where
  appropriate

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Analyses of questionnaires Factor analysis of
the complete set of scales

• Factor I Good experiences of teaching
  outcomes
• linked to low surface approach in electronic
  engineering
• Factor II Deep approach with interest in the
  subject
• Factor III Organised effort put into studying
• Factor IV Surface approach with lack of
  purpose
• linked to choosing unit because thought to be
  easy (EE)
• Factor V Perceived easiness and achievement
• linked to prior achievement and low surface in
  EE

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Mean scale scores for three unitsReasons for
taking the degree and the unit

• Course unit A (94) B
  (68) C (54)
• Reasons for taking the degree
• Career 4.14 4.22 4.39
• Interest 4.08 3.87 3.70
• Social 4.10 4.03 4.02
• Lack of purpose 1.78 2.00
  2.85
• Reasons for taking the unit
• Needed for career 3.20 3.28 3.62
• Interest 4.05 3.82 3.50
• Importance 4.45 4.30 4.04
• Expected easiness 1.60 1.62 1.57
• All scales recalculated to be on a 1-5 (high)
  scale with a median of 3

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Mean scale scores for three unitsApproaches to
studying and perceived easiness of unit

• Course unit A (94)
  B (68) C (54)
• Approaches to learning and studying
• Deep approach prior to unit 3.76 3.55
  3.41
• Surface approach prior to unit 2.51
  2.80 3.11
• Effort 3.57 3.64 3.61
• Difference in deep during unit -
  0.45 - 0.14 0.11
• Difference in surface during unit 0.54
  0.19 - 0.33
• Perceived easiness of demands made by unit
• Knowledge 3.41 3.73 3.35
• Pace 2.40 3.02 3.63
• Academic difficulty 2.62 2.89
  2.99
• Workload 2.57 2.92 3.30

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Mean scale scores for three unitsExperiences of
teaching and knowledge acquired

• Course unit A (94)
  B (68) C (54)
• Clear aims and well-organised unit 3.86
  3.71 4.47
• Teaching focusing on understanding 3.17
  3.39 3.69
• Set work and feedback for WTP 3.52 3.05
  3.87
• Staff enthusiasm and support 4.10
  4.24 4.66
• Support from other students 3.95 3.89
  3.96
• Interest and enjoyment 3.03 3.05
  4.19
• Knowledge and skills acquired 3.63 3.62
  4.13

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Changes in approaches to studying Percentage
agreement with items before and during units

• Course unit A (94)
  B (68) C (54)
• I usually set out to understand
  Before 95.6 87.5 81.2
• During 72.1 82.5 75.0
• Trouble making sense of things Before 25.0
  40.0 43.7
• During 61.8 55.0
  34.4
• Generally put a lot of effort in
  Before 60.3 77.5 53.1
• 
  During 51.5 60.0 40.6
• Systematic and organised study Before 65.9
  62.5 46.9
  During 44.1 47.5 50.0

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Experiences of teaching Percentage agreement
with items on the same three units

• Course unit A (94) B (68)
  C (54)
• Easy pace in lectures 25.3 46.9
  72.5
• Amount of work required easy 33.3 34.7
  52.5
• Teaching fitted in with learning 72.0 67.3
  97.5
• Most of material was interesting 45.3 34.7
  82.5
• Plenty of examples provided 66.7 51.0
  95.0
• Staff were patient in explaining 81.3 81.6
  92.5
• Feedback given made things clearer 63.7 30.6
  47.5

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Attitudes and approaches to studying - 1

• Youre repeatedly reading it, hearing it,
  talking about it, doing it, doing it, doing it
  and that doesnt work for me. For first, second
  and part of third year, it was a case of scraping
  by. Ive tried to go through the motions its
  the sameness. Each day is that pattern.
• At the beginning I was all at sea, sort of too
  much information at one time. I just think that
  were given too many different concepts at one
  time It seemed that once wed gone over one
  specific network we werent given enough time to
  absorb the information before we were given
  another one, and the difficulty level increased
  as you went onwards.

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Attitudes and approaches to studying - 2

• You have to focus your energy where its
  rewarded You work through the problems and for
  the analogue ones, you dont get any answers out
  of them.
• You cant see how in the world you got from
  point a to point b. I tended to work blindly.
  I knew if I just followed these steps, then I
  could get an answer, but have no idea what to do
  and yet we scrape by.
• We probably would have got great marks had we
  actually understood what we were doing.

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Delayed understanding

• In second year I got a better understanding of
  what I learnt
• in first year. Now in third year Ive kind of
  learnt what I was
• supposed to know in second year. Its a shame
  Ive never
• felt that Ive learned it in the actual year it
  was taught
• When youre being taught something, youre just
  desperately
• trying to learn it, and theres not necessarily a
  whole lot of
• interest. Youre scrambling back to notes in
  preparing for
• the exams, trying to understand the course. Later
  on, you
• do get interested and then things start to fall
  into place.

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• What do these findings suggest to you?
• What were the problems facing the students?
• What do you see as the main causes of them?
• What might be done to overcome them?

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Difficulties in learning analogue

• Seeing the relevance when carrying out analyses
• Coping with the pace as new ideas are introduced
• Lack of variety in the teaching-learning
  experiences
• Not understanding which type of circuit is
  involved
• Reduced confidence through failing to solve
  problems
• Not enough feedback to understand mistakes

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Collaborative initiatives in analogue

• Increase students focus on understanding by
  reflecting on problem-solving processes
• Problem-solving in electronics stressed and
  modelled during lectures examples
  classes
• Students encouraged to use a log-book to
  record and comment on solutions
• Arrangements made to facilitate systematic
  group discussion during tutorials

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Helpfulness of teaching-learning activities
in three units involved in the collaborative
initiative

• Mean ratings on 1 -7 scale Unit A
  Unit B Unit C
• (N 59) (73)
  (27)
• The way diagrams presented 5.0
  5.3 5.9
• The way ideas explained in lectures 4.3
  5.6 5.2
• Lecture explanations of problems 4.2
  5.8 4.9
• Worked examples provided 5.0 3.6
  5.7
• Working on problems on own 5.2 4.6
  5.3
• Using the log-book 4.2 4.3 5.1
• Staff help in tutorials 5.0 4.0
  5.9
• Discussions with other students 4.8
  4.7 5.0

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The logic of teaching analogue
electronicsTeaching-learning activities
necessary in supporting learning

• Circuits linked to real-life illustrations from
  industry
• Main circuit components highlighted in diagrams
• Functions of circuits fully explained with
  examples
• Ways of thinking about circuits exemplified
• Students work through varied examples comment
• Worked examples provided and fully explained
• Sufficient tutors available to provide prompt
  advice
• Progress monitored in tutorial work and tests

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References related to project

• See papers in International Journal of
  Electrical Engineering Education 42/1, 2005, and
  other papers on, or forthcoming, on project
  web-site at www.ed.ac.uk/etl/publications.html
• McCune, V., Hounsell, D. J. (2005). The
  development of students ways of thinking and
  practising in three final-year biology courses.
  Higher Education, 49, 255289

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Indicative general references

• Biggs, J. B. (2003). Teaching for Quality
  Learning at University. (2nd Ed). Buckingham
  SRHE and Open University Press.
• Entwistle, N. J. (1998). Improving teaching
  through research in student learning. In J. J. F.
  Forest (Ed.), University Teaching International
  Perspectives (pp. 73-112). New York Garland
  Publishing.
• Entwistle, N. J. (2003). Concepts and conceptual
  frameworks underpinning the ETL project. ETL
  Occasional Reports, 3, see the project web site
• Marton, F., Säljö, R. (1997). Approaches to
  learning.
• In Marton, F., Hounsell, D. J., Entwistle, N.
  J. (Eds.), The Experience of Learning (2nd ed.)
  (pp. 39-58). Edinburgh Scottish Academic Press
  (now on project web site).