Teaching-learning environments and student learning in electronic engineering

1
Designing teaching-learning environments to
promote disciplinary ways of thinking
Noel Entwistle University of Edinburgh Project
web site www.ed.ac.uk/etl
2
Troublesome knowledge

• Ritual knowledge - names and dates are rote
  learned
• Inert knowledge that the student does not often
  use
• Conceptually difficult knowledge
• such as complex technical knowledge or ideas
  affected by mistaken expectations derived from
  everyday experience
• Alien knowledge/Threshold Concepts
• e.g., presentism in history
• Tacit knowledge - acted on but not conscious of.
• Perkins (in press)

3
Threshold conceptsin economics

• A threshold concept can be considered as akin
  to a portal,
• opening up a new and previously inaccessible
  way of thinking
• about something. It represents a transformed
  way of
• understanding or viewing something without
  which the learner
• cannot progress.
• For example, if opportunity cost is
  accepted by students as a
• valid way of interpreting the world, it
  fundamentally changes their
• way of thinking about their own choices, as
  well as serving as a
• tool to interpret the choices made by others.
• Meyer Land (2003)

4
Characteristics of Threshold Concepts - The
Jewels in the Curriculum
Transformative ontological as well as conceptual
shift Usually irreversible, therefore retained
once you see in a different way Often
integrative highlights previously hidden
interconnections Bounded by discipline and should
be treated as provisional/explanatory Likely to
involve troublesome knowledge, reverses intuitive
understanding emotional component of letting go
and tolerating confusion Requires teachers to
gaze backwards across threshold listen to
students to gauge mis/alternate conceptions
5

• Other examples of Threshold Concepts
• Statistics example earlier
• Historical Thinking example
• handouts
• your examples?

6
Delayed understandingTerm introduced by Scheja,
in press

• 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 that 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. And at some point during
  the learning
• process, you do get interested and then things
  start to fall into place

7
Reaction to the lack of understanding

• 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.

8
Ways of thinking and practising in the subject
(WTP)

• During most of the interviews, staff seemed to be
  more comfortable to talk about what we came to
  see as the ways of thinking and practising in the
  subject, rather than about the formally defined
  intended learning objectives
• Ways of thinking and practising in the subject
  describe the richness, depth and breadth of what
  students might learn through engagement with a
  given subject area in a specific context. This
  might include 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)

9
Ways of thinking in economics

• More recently I've come round to the view that
  economists have
• acquired a way of looking at the world which is
  indelible, and even
• though they may not find themselves in a
  position where they can
• use their analytical techniques very
  consciously, in fact their
• whole way of treating questions is affected by
  this kind of training.
• quoted in Entwistle (1997)

10
.Discussion of ways of designing TLEs to
promote disciplinary ways of thinking

• Select a particular topic area from your own
  experience.
• What are the main ways of thinking and practising
  that you would want students to acquire? A
  starting point could be thinking about what is
  involved in adopting a deep approach in that
  subject area.
• Is it possible to discern an inner logic which
  makes certain forms of teaching essential if
  students are to learn easily and effectively?
• How are these forms of teaching currently being
  provided? To what extent do these appear to be
  congruent with the WTPs?
• What aspects of knowledge prove troublesome for
  students? Could these difficulties be discussed
  more explicitly with students? Would it be
  possible to spend more time on these aspects and
  check that understanding before moving on?

11
Session 4 exploration of this fascinating topic
stops hereread on if you wish!
12
Throughlines to keep the focus on understanding

• Throughlines reflect what teachers believe is
  most important
• for the students to learn in their course
  (WTPs)
• These goals are set out clearly and revisited
  regularly during
• the course to keep the students focused on the
  understanding
• aims decided for the course (i.e. aims with
  that focus).
• Introduced as part of the Teaching for
  Understanding Framework
• developed by the Harvard Graduate School of
  Education Project Zero.
• (Wiske, 2003)

13
Ways of thinking and practising 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

14
The inner logic of teaching analogue Essential
teaching-learning emphases and activities

• Circuits linked to real-life illustrations from
  industry
• Main circuit components highlighted in diagrams
• Ways of thinking about circuits exemplified
• Ways of solving tutorial problems explained
• Students work through sets of varied examples
• Worked examples provided at the appropriate time
• Progress monitored in tutorial work and tests

15
Supporting student learning in analogue

• Conclusions emerging from work on electronic
  engineering
• The WTPs suggest an inner logic to the subject
  area and its
• pedagogy - certain teaching-learning emphases
  and activities
• are essential.
• But these aspects of the teaching-learning
  environment are
• currently offered in ways which may not suit
  even a majority of
• students. The detailed feedback from students
  provided
• suggestions about how all the elements might be
  enhanced.
• The general literature on teaching and learning
  in higher
• education also suggested other possibilities
  that could be
• adapted to the pedagogy of electronic
  engineering

16
Overall findings from the ETL project

• Generic pedagogic principles and methods need to
  be reinterpreted in terms of the inner logic of
  the subject
• Conceptually-based feedback from students can be
  used to enhance the congruence of
  teaching-learning environments
• Emphasising WTPs (rather than intended learning
  outcomes) have advantages in broadening the
  students focus in studying
• Students are finding that a lack of detailed,
  prompt and intelligible feedback is affecting
  their learning
• In large first-year classes, problems are being
  created by a lack of uniform practices and of
  shared information among teaching staff and
  tutors

17
Ways of thinking in history

• Seeing history as being socially constructed and
  contested
• Interpreting, synthesising and evaluating
  historical evidence
• Placing events and topics within broader
  historical contexts
• Alertness to interconnections among phenomena
• Being sensitive to the strangeness of the past
• Viewing events from different perspectives

18
Enhancing TLEs in history

• Refining and reinforcing thematic structures of
  modules by reducing the emphasis on chronology or
  reducing the time period
• Sharing more explicitly with students and other
  staff the reasoning behind module structures and
  links with overall WTPs
• Providing students with more detailed
  discipline-specific guidance on the specific
  skills required to read documents and analyse
  evidence
• Making more materials available through virtual
  learning environments
• Modelling explicitly in lectures and tutorials
  how historians go about marshalling evidence to
  support or contest different lines of argument
• Providing supportive tutorial environments to
  provide intellectual challenge without personal
  threat

19
Ways of thinking in economics

• Using theoretical abstractions to think about the
  real world
• Understanding economic concepts and models
• Using deductive and inductive reasoning to
  analyse situations
• Interpreting econometric results from statistics
  and graphs
• Interpreting empirical evidence and understanding
  the relationship between theory and data
• Developing awareness of interconnections between
  concepts in making sense of the wider picture of
  real-world economics

20
Enhancing TLEs in economics

• Considering ways of coping with the diversity of
  student intakes in first- year classes
• Putting greater emphasis on conceptual aspects of
  the subject and avoiding unnecessary reliance on
  the detailed analysis of evidence
• Identifying threshold concepts, teaching them
  more intensively and ensuring that assessment
  emphasises rewards their understanding
• Providing greater variety in students
  experiences of teaching and learning and in the
  assessment procedures adopted
• Developing assessment procedures that encourage
  broader revision for exams while stressing the
  importance of problem solving
• Trying to bridge the theory-real world divide
  more effectively by using more authentic
  problem-solving

21
Ways of thinking in biological sciences

• Understanding the nature of evidence and how it
  is generated
• Thinking critically about evidence and its
  interpretation
• Using visualisation where appropriate and
  thinking systematically
• Understanding relationships between findings and
  theory
• Designing and carrying out small-scale research
  studies
• Recognising that evidence is contested and
  theories provisional
• Making interconnections between topics and seeing
  them in a real-world wider context

22
Enhancing TLEs in biological sciences

• Providing fuller explanations about the reasons
  behind encouraging first-year students to develop
  some of the communication skills used by
  biologists in a assignment about explaining
  concepts to lay people
• Encouraging better communication between
  lecturers and tutors on a first-year biological
  sciences course and trying to make the level of
  marking of coursework by tutors more consistent
• Helping students to adjust to the epistemological
  and technical challenges encountered by a
  step-change in learning requirements between
  second-year and final year
• Bringing in active researchers to contribute to a
  final year module so that students heard how the
  subject was progressing. Also working on actual
  data to develop research skills.