Are They Engaged Technology and Active Learning

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Are They Engaged?Technology and Active Learning
AAPT National Meeting, Albuquerque, Jan. 2005

• Peter Sheldon
• Department of Physics

physics.rmwc.edu/learn
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FoxTrot by Bill Amend
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Overview
Intro ProsCons ActiveLearning Technology
Impact

• Pros and Cons of Technology
• Overview proven improved teaching and learning
  methods
• Technologies used to help implement good pedagogy
• Impact

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Background
Intro ProsCons ActiveLearning Technology
Impact

• Davidson College Physlets
• AAPT New Faculty Workshop
• AAPT Reform of Introductory Physics Workshop
• PKAL Making Creative Use of Emerging
  Technologies to Enhance Student Learning
• MERLOT Assistant Editor
• Develop and test uses of classroom technology at
  R-MWC

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Is It All That?
Intro ProsCons ActiveLearning Technology
Impact

• Overheard at a college-wide strategic planning
  session
• Technology is passive learning.
• The computer is such an impersonal object.
• The technology should not drive how they think.

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Is It All That?
Intro ProsCons ActiveLearning Technology
Impact

• Technology enhances the possibilities for active
  learning.
• Technology can help to make the course more
  personal.
• The ways students think and learn best should
  drive the technology.

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Perils
Intro ProsCons ActiveLearning Technology
Impact

• Glitzy/Entertainment
• Can drive what we do
• Students confuse downloading with learning
• Easy to plagiarize
• Can be used to replace the professor
• Information overload

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Common Elements of Reform
Intro ProsCons ActiveLearning Technology
Impact

• Learning rather than teaching
• Relevant, complex problem solving
• Collaborative groups
• Tied to research
• Students learn best from real world problems
• Appropriate uses of technology
• Active Learning

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Specific Pedagogies
Intro ProsCons ActiveLearning Technology
Impact

• Interactive Problem Solving
• Just in Time Teaching
• Peer Instruction
• Interactive Instruction

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Technology for Active Learning
Intro ProsCons ActiveLearning Technology
Impact

• Personal Response Systems (PRS)
• Physlets
• Multimedia Educational Resource for Learning and
  Online Teaching (MERLOT)
• Smartboard/Starboard
• World Wide Web

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Intro ProsCons ActiveLearning Technology
Impact
PRS

• Peer Instruction (PI) and general classroom
  interaction
• Peer Instruction (Eric Mazur, Harvard U.)
• Collaborative Learning
• Interactive Classroom
• Example
• Interactive Instruction

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Physlets
Intro ProsCons ActiveLearning Technology
Impact

• Web-based, interactive problems
• Interactive problem solving
• Simulation rather than static representation
• Example
• Just in Time Teaching

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Smartboard/Starboard
Intro ProsCons ActiveLearning Technology
Impact
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World Wide Web
Intro ProsCons ActiveLearning Technology
Impact

• JiTT
• Simulations
• Relevant and Real World Problems
• Tied to research
• Create them yourself, or how do you find useful
  resources?

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Intro ProsCons ActiveLearning Technology
Impact
MERLOT is a free and open resource designed for
faculty and students. Links to online learning
materials are collected here along with
annotations such as peer reviews and
assignments. www.merlot.org
Search for useful teaching materialSubmit your
own online material for peer review
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Impact PI and PRS
Intro ProsCons ActiveLearning Technology
Impact

• At R-MWC, PI has been used and the Force Concept
• Inventory (FCI) has been given since 1998.

• Hagen, Crouch and Mazur (TPT, 4/02) note that
  typically a non-PI class will have glt0.3, and a
  PI class will have ggt0.3

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Impact on Learning and Engagement
Intro ProsCons ActiveLearning Technology
Impact

• Anecdotally, many have found that using these and
  other classroom technologies have increased
  engagement of students in class and have helped
  to boost enrollments in physics courses.
• At R-MWC

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Active Engagement Introduced in 1998
Intro ProsCons ActiveLearning Technology
Impact
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Impact PRS
Intro ProsCons ActiveLearning Technology
Impact

• New York Times 4/29/04
• More participation, more engagement, more student
  satisfaction
• I have experienced the same thing 100 student
  participation, positive comments on course
  evaluations
• We started a study in the middle-school
  classroom, and have observed that it helps to
  increase the participation, and in particular
  with girls in science

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Impact MERLOT and WWW

• Simulations
• Relevant problems
• Active engagement
• Has been shown to increase student engagement and
  persistence

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References

• Fagen, Crouch, Mazur, Peer Insruction Results
  from Range of Classrooms, TPT 40, p. 206 (April
  2002)
• Crouch and Mazur, Peer Instruction Ten years of
  experience and results, AJP 69, p. 970 (Sept.
  2001)
• Eric Mazur, Peer Instruction (Prentice Hall,
  1997)
• http//webphysics.davidson.edu/Applets/resources/b
  ooks_articles.html
• Christian and Belloni, Physlet Physics (Prentice
  Hall, 2004)
• Novak et al., Just in Time Teaching (Prentice
  Hall, 1999)
• www.merlot.org
• www.jitt.org
• These references, this talk, and more can be
  found at http//physics.rmwc.edu/learn