Using Personal Response Technology to Enhance Student Engagement in Lectures

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Using Personal Response Technology to Enhance
Student Engagement in Lectures
Keynote Address, November 2008
Challenging Assumptions
NAIRTL 2nd Annual Conference
Tom Haffie Learning Development Coordinator, Facu
lty of Science Coordinator, PRESSWestern Lectur
er, Biology Dept. University of Western Ontario,
London, Ontario CANADA
Theory
Theory
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NAIRTL 2nd Annual Conference
Theory
Theory
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WARNING

• This presentation employs several psychological
  techniques and nifty electronic technologies
  known to induce a cycle of unlearning and
  relearning. Participants may experience mild
  to severe discomfort as naïve understandings
  mature. There is also a significant risk of
  infection with ideas that could, in turn, spread
  to colleagues and loved ones.

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If this is broadcasting . . .
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this must be broadcollecting . . .
broadcollecting . . .
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PRESSWestern Project

• Campus-wide standardization of hardware,
  software, fleshware and academic policy.
• Radio-frequency clickers are purchased by about
  5,000 students in a wide variety of courses.
• Units are programmed with unique identifier
  information.
• Click responses are received, displayed and
  recorded by instructor computer.
• Click record is one component of academic record.

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Teaching and Learning meets Clickers . . .
Engaged Pedagogy
Emerging Technology
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Challenging Assumptions

• Irish people dont discuss personal finances in
  public.

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0
What will your annual income likely be this year
()?

1. lt 50 000
2. 50 000 to 74 000
3. 75 000 to 99 000
4. 100 000 to 124 000
5. 125 000 and up

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0
Did you just lie about what your annual income
will be this year?

1. Yes
2. No
3. Lets change the subject.

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Challenging Assumptions

• Irish people dont discuss personal finances in
  public.
• Lectures are for gathering straw.

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Drosophila Notation

• Drosophila genetic notation is different than the
  Aa style
• for Drosophila there is a wild type
• Mutant alleles are named after the new phenotype
  they cause
• Dominant mutant alleles are uppercase recessive
  mutant alleles are lowercase.
• Normal alleles are indicated by a

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Challenging Assumptions

• Irish people dont discuss personal finances in
  public.
• Lectures are for gathering straw.
• Higher education is a complicated process.

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Complexivist Learning Systems

• What if we looked at our class of students and
  saw, not a room full of individual learners, but
  a mutually interdependent learning system - of
  which we are one component?
• What are the conditions under which learning may
  emerge?

Theory
Complexity and Education Davis and Sumara, 2006
Theory

• Diversity
• Redundancy
• Diffuse Authority
• Neighbour Relations
• Enabling Constraints

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Diversity
0
For those of you who have at least one child,
how certain are you of who their parents
are? Would you bet ()?

1. 1
2. 100
3. 10 000
4. 100 000
5. I dont know who the parent(s) of my child are.

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The Case of MaryJane

• A 52 yr old woman, we will call her MaryJane,
  suffered renal failure.
• Amid the stressful wait for identification of
  potential kidney donors, it was discovered that
  she was not the mother of two of her three sons.
• What might the evidence be?

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Karyotype
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Blood Cells
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Diversity of blood type
0
What is your blood type?

1. A
2. B
3. AB
4. O
5. I dont know.

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Blood Cells
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HLA Genotypes
MaryJane
Yu et al. N Engl J Med, 2002
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Application . . .

1. 1, 2
2. 1, 3
3. 2, 3
4. No way to know.
5. I dont know.

?
MaryJane
Which HLA haplotypes must MaryJanes deceased
father have had?
Yu et al. N Engl J Med, 2002
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Synthesis (Neighbour relations)
What is the likelihood that MaryJane will have a
child with HLA genotype of either 1,6 or 3,5?

• 1/2 x 1/2 x 1/2 x 1/2
• (1/2 x 1/2) (1/2 x 1/2)
• 1/4 x 1/4 x 1/4 x 1/4
• (1/4 x 1/4) (1/4 x 1/4)
• I dont know.

MaryJane
Yu et al. N Engl J Med, 2002
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Neighbour relations
What is the likelihood that MaryJane will have a
child with HLA genotype of either 1,6 or 3,5?

• 1/2 x 1/2 x 1/2 x 1/2
• (1/2 x 1/2) (1/2 x 1/2)
• 1/4 x 1/4 x 1/4 x 1/4
• (1/4 x 1/4) (1/4 x 1/4)
• I dont know.

MaryJane
Yu et al. N Engl J Med, 2002
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and now for the weirdness . . .
MaryJane
Yu et al. N Engl J Med, 2002
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HLA haplotypes in other tissues?
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in the classroom . . .
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Research Data Novice Science Students
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Research Data
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Research Data

• How often do you try to answer correctly (as
  opposed to just clicking to get participation
  grade)?

Never Almost Never Sometimes Almost Always Always
0 1 4 24 71
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Research Data

• Rate the extent to which the use of clickers has
  affected your learning.
• Why did clickers have this effect?
• very frustrating, never loads in time. . .
  limited time makes us more anxious . . . they
  give you a chance to test yourself dailysee
  what concepts to study moreencourages me to
  attend classprof knows if the topic requires
  further explanation

Greatly Interfered Somewhat Interfered No Effect Somewhat Facilitated Greatly Facilitated
1 4 9 70 17
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Research Data

• Overall, 85 of students reported increasing
  study strategies.

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from the Literature
From the literature . . .
Hake. 1998. Interactive-engagement versus
traditional methods a six-thousand -student
survey of mechanics test data for introductory
physics courses. Am J. Phys. 66

• Gain vs Pretest for traditional vs
  interactive courses (Force Concept Inventory or
  Mechanics Diagnostic).

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from the Literature
From the literature . . .
Reay et al. 2008. Testing a new voting machine
methodology. Am J. Phys. 72

• Pre/Post test score gains for men and women vs.
  clicker use (Conceptual Survey of Electricity and
  Magnetism).

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Implications for Practice
Implications for Practice

• Students participate enthusiastically, providing
  an opportunity to establish active class
  culture.
• Such engaged pedagogies can support a wide range
  of educational outcomes.
• Students may need coaching to make use of
  formative feedback.

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Implications for Practice
Implications for Practice

• 4. Students are willing to reconsider their study
  strategies but may need support in adopting
  higher level skills and effective help-seeking.
• 5. The simple presence of clickers in the
  classroom increases meta-cognitive self-awareness
  (for students and staff) use this opening to
  preface broader discussions of effective teaching
  and learning.

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Challenging Assumptions

• Irish people do not discuss personal finances in
  public.
• Lectures are for gathering straw.
• Higher education is a complicated process.
• Canadians can not learn to play rugby.

Ireland Canada 55 0
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NAIRTL 2nd Annual Conference

• Thank You!

Tom Haffie thaffie_at_uwo.ca

• Please return clickers!