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Abstract BackgroundThe first day of class helps students learn about what to expect from their instructors and courses. Messaging used by instructors, which varies in content and approach on the first day, shapes classroom social dynamics and can affect subsequent learning in a course. Prior work established the non-content Instructor Talk Framework to describe the language that instructors use to create learning environments, but little is known about the extent to which students detect those messages. In this study, we paired first day classroom observation data with results from student surveys to measure how readily students in introductory STEM courses detect non-content Instructor Talk. ResultsTo learn more about the instructor and student first day experiences, we studied 11 introductory STEM courses at two different institutions. The classroom observation data were used to characterize course structure and use of non-content Instructor Talk. The data revealed that all instructors spent time discussing their instructional practices, building instructor/student relationships, and sharing strategies for success with their students. After class, we surveyed students about the messages their instructors shared during the first day of class and determined that the majority of students from within each course detected messaging that occurred at a higher frequency. For lower frequency messaging, we identified nuances in what students detected that may help instructors as they plan their first day of class. ConclusionsFor instructors who dedicate the first day of class to establishing positive learning environments, these findings provide support that students are detecting the messages. Additionally, this study highlights the importance of instructors prioritizing the messages they deem most important and giving them adequate attention to more effectively reach students. Setting a positive classroom environment on the first day may lead to long-term impacts on student motivation and course retention. These outcomes are relevant for all students, but in particular for students in introductory STEM courses which are often critical prerequisites for being in a major.
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Characterizing social behavior patterns in teaching assistant interactions with students
Understanding how relationships between instructors and students develop is important for understanding the undergraduate student experience. We expect the development of positive relationships is related to the social practices (e.g., greetings, using names, sympathizing, or empathizing with students) that instructors use in the course of normal classroom interactions with students. We recorded interactions between instructors and students in remote synchronous online physics problem-solving sessions and surveyed students about their perceptions of their instructors. We selected the highest-rated instructor and lowest-rated instructor in our sample and identified social practices in their conversations with students. We first characterized the frequency of social practice usage by each instructor in their conversations with students. We find that both instructors relied on a set of core social practices in most conversations with students, but that our higher-rated instructor used comparatively more positive commentary and sympathizing or empathizing behaviors than our lower-rated instructor. In comparison, our lower-rated instructor engaged in more negative commentary. Using network analysis, we then explored patterns in co-occurrences of social practices used by each instructor moment-to-moment in conversations and compared the instructors’ social practice network patterns. We find that our higher rated-instructor used a greater variety of social practices during moment-to-moment interactions with students, while our lower-rated instructor spent most of his time focused on classroom business. We suggest that professional development for instructors should include guidance on how messages are delivered in classes and encourage the use of high-impact social practices to foster positive relationships with students.
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- Award ID(s):
- 2013315
- PAR ID:
- 10486792
- Publisher / Repository:
- American Physical Society
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Physical Review Physics Education Research
- Volume:
- 19
- Issue:
- 2
- ISSN:
- 2469-9896
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 020129---1-23
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
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Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevPhysEducRes.19.020129
