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Title: Promoting adoption of active learning and use of strategies to reduce student resistance to active learning
Award ID(s):
1821277
NSF-PAR ID:
10113482
Author(s) / Creator(s):
Date Published:
Journal Name:
Research in Engineering Education Symposium: Making Connections
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
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  1. abstract

    Prior studies of active learning (AL) efficacy have typically lacked dosage designs (e.g., varying intensities rather than simple presence or absence) or specification of whether misconceptions were part of the instructional treatments. In this study, we examine the extent to which different doses of AL (approximately 10%, 15%, 20%, 36% of unit time), doses of misconception-focused instruction (MFI; approximately 0%, 8%, 11%, 13%), and their intersections affect evolution learning. A quantitative, quasiexperimental study (N > 1500 undergraduates) was conducted using a pretest, posttest, delayed posttest design with multiple validated measures of evolution understanding. The student background variables (e.g., binary sex, race or ethnicity), evolution acceptance, and prior coursework were controlled. The results of hierarchical linear and logistic models indicated that higher doses of AL and MFI were associated with significantly larger knowledge and abstract reasoning gains and misconception declines. MFI produced significant learning above and beyond AL. Explicit misconception treatments, coupled with AL, should be explored in more areas of life science education.

     
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  2. Abstract: Our research has identified strategies instructors can use to reduce student resistance to active learning, and we are developing a workshop intervention to change instructors’ motivation and behaviour related to adoption of active learning and of these strategies. We are using a randomized control trial to assess the impact of the workshop on instructors’ value, self-efficacy, and actual adoption of both active learning and the strategies to reduce resistance. In this paper, we describe our processes for recruiting workshop participants and for developing an instructor survey to assess the impact of the workshop. 
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