I’m delighted to put up as this week’s blog a piece by Professor Bob Farmer. (Who is he? See at the end of the blog.)
Professor Eric Mazur is a distinguished Harvard physicist with a deep interest in teaching and learning. In the past, as a traditional university lecturer, he was successful in helping his classes achieve better than average grades and his clear lectures and demonstrations were highly rated by his students. More recently, however, Professor Mazur came to the staggering conclusion that his success as a teacher ‘was a complete illusion, a house of cards’.
This revelation came about when he tried testing his students with some ‘apparently simple’ questions which focused on fundamental concepts. These indicated that their understanding was ‘next to nothing’. It was then that he began to realise that, although the majority of his students could successfully apply a surface approach in recalling and using formulas for solving textbook-style questions, as many as two thirds floundered when it came to tackling what, to a seasoned professional physicist, were straightforward word problems that demanded an understanding of the underlying concepts behind the formulas.
Mazur’s solution was to flip his approach to teaching where, traditionally, students had come to lectures, taken notes and then (hopefully) followed up with further study. He did this by setting reading and problem-solving tasks to be completed before coming to class. Students are now given an assignment in the days before ‘lectures’ when they are asked three questions which they are expected to answer online. Two refer to the subject matter, however, Mazur is more interested in how his students attempt these problems rather than whether or not they get the right answers, so the third question asks what, if anything, they are having difficulty with and what it is they cannot fully understand. Marks are then awarded for effort, not right answers, and students know that up to ten percent of their final grade is based on this preparatory study. This is the critical motivator since average students soon become aware that there is no point in trying to join in subsequent classroom sessions if they have not done the preparatory work and the brightest students realise that they will fail to get an overall ‘A’ grade if they cannot be bothered to undertake these tasks.
In follow-up classes Mazur employs an interactive teaching method, sometimes referred to as peer group teaching. This is based on what, by questioning, he had already discovered of his students’ understanding, or lack of it, together with some carefully designed multiple-choice ‘concept questions’. Students are first asked to work on a concept question on their own, to think about the answer and then to share their solution with one or two colleagues who are sitting nearby. Immediately the lecture theatre is abuzz with students talking. Mazur noticed that students with the right answers are often able to convince colleagues with the wrong answers, probably because they are in a better position to appreciate hang-ups rather than someone like himself, a middle aged professor steeped as he is in his subject. Mazur also admits that he probably had many of the same misconceptions at their age. Finally, as an added technological bonus, students respond to these questions (anonymously) by using ‘clickers’ (similar to a TV remote) which provide valuable instant feedback by measuring their responses before and after they share thoughts with their peers.
Professor Mazur points out that inventing suitable concepts questions is difficult and time consuming since they focus on real world situations such as a heavy truck in collision with a light car, light bulbs in direct current circuits etc and do not involve problems requiring maths and specific problem solving strategies. Designing a series of such questions with credible answers is not something that the hard pressed teacher can undertake lightly. It’s perhaps significant, therefore, that his method was not taken up by colleagues in other universities before the publication of handbook of suitable exercises.
Mazur found that his interactive teaching tripled students’ gains in knowledge as measured by the conceptual tests and also provided significant gains in the end of semester exam scores. He also discovered improved measurable long term retention of knowledge since, as he points out, ‘… it’s difficult to forget what you really understand’. Finally, it was found that the gender gap as measured by the difference between male and female scores of students taking traditional physics courses was closed. Both men and women gain by being taught in this way but women gain proportionally more and close the gap.
For more, check out this video on YouTube. Mazur’s lecture lasts about one hour. I personally found it to be inspiring. (Be warned, the sound volume is low, you may have to use a headset)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WwslBPj8GgI&feature=youtube_gdata_player
Professor Bob Farmer has a background in the Physical Sciences and started teaching as an Education Officer in the RAF, teaching Electronics. In the latter stages of his RAF career, in the 1960s, he worked at the RAF’s School of Education in a research and development unit on what were then new methods of teaching which included programmed learning, teaching machines and the use of CCTV for instructor training.
In 1971 he joined the staff of the City of Birmingham College of Education with responsibility for Educational Technology. In 1979 he was appointed Head of the Educational Unit at what became the University of Central England, where he developed a PGCE course for the staff of the University. It was at the time a unique course based on a reflective learning cycle which made strong connections between learning and practice. It made innovatory use of the virtual learning environment for resource material and feedback from tutors. Existing staff as well as new staff elected to take the course and many went on to do modules leading to a master’s degree.
He was a consultant to the Oxford Centre for Staff Development and an early founder member of the Staff Education Development Association, where he worked with Phil Race, Graham Gibbs and others to raise teaching standards in Higher Education.
He initiated the use of Breakthrough to Learning as UCE’s Widening Participation programme, which in 2005 won the THES prize in the category.