First Steps Toward Increasing Student Engagement During Lecture Timothy F. Slater Citation: The Physics Teacher 46, 317 (2008); doi: 10.1119/1.2909759 View online: http://dx.doi.org/10.1119/1.2909759 View Table of Contents: http://scitation.aip.org/content/aapt/journal/tpt/46/5?ver=pdfcov Published by the American Association of Physics Teachers Articles you may be interested in Alignment of TAs' beliefs with practice and student perception AIP Conf. Proc. 1513, 98 (2013); 10.1063/1.4789661 Physics Exam Problems Reconsidered: Using Logger Pro to Evaluate Student Understanding of Physics Phys. Teach. 46, 494 (2008); 10.1119/1.2999067 Engaging Student Learning in Science Through Writing Tasks Phys. Teach. 46, 123 (2008); 10.1119/1.2834540 Strategies for Adopting Interactive Engagement Methods Phys. Teach. 45, 395 (2007); 10.1119/1.2768707 Assign a Writing Task to Improve Student Engagement at Public Lectures Phys. Teach. 44, 124 (2006); 10.1119/1.2165451 This article is copyrighted as indicated in the article. Reuse of AAPT content is subject to the terms at: http://scitation.aip.org/termsconditions. Downloaded to IP: 152.117.151.73 On: Mon, 31 Oct 2016 20:57:36 or the Patricia Blanton, Column Editor F Watauga High School, Boone, NC 28607; New Teacher [email protected] First Steps Toward Increasing Student Engagement During Lecture, Timothy F. Slater, University of Wyoming ave you tried to repurpose mate- tive, “It’s not what the teacher does providing students with complete Hrials you’ve gotten from another that matters; rather, it is what the stu- copies of lecture notes, give them lecturer or publisher that you thought dents do.” In a learner-centered teach- fragmented notes to be completed could express a concept exceptionally ing environment, the role of lecture is during a lecture to give them an ex- well, only to find when you used the radically shifted to a focus on guiding pert-like skeletal structure on which same materials, they did not have the students through meaningful learning to build their understanding. dramatic effect on your students you experiences. The pathway to giving The central part of a learner-cen- desired? It would be easy to conclude great lectures is to say less and change tered approach is to ask questions. that student apathy is to blame. But, if listener behavior from passive to active! The questions posed should be students listening to your lecture take Teachers who have navigated the road nonrhetorical questions and should on the same bored appearance and pas- to student engagement rarely go back be at a cognitive level requiring sive disposition often observed when to teaching mostly by telling. more thought than just relying on you are showing a video, consider Lecturing about science and tech- preexisting declarative knowledge. whether your instructional approach is nology has a distinct advantage over Classrooms of students respond- designed to intellectually engage stu- other disciplines in that demonstra- ing quickly, and in unison, can be dents. An information-download lec- tions can be provocative, provide il- mistaken for meaningful dialogue. ture has often been described as…the lustrative clarification, and excite the Questions should be intellectually process by which the teacher’s notes get learner with unexpected phenomena. challenging and be carefully crafted transferred into students’ notebooks with- Research on the actual effectiveness to lead the students to deeper levels out passing through the brains of either. of demonstrations shows the most of understanding. Questions such as That brilliant set of lecture materials important part of the demonstration “does everyone understand?” and “do that you thought would be perfect is asking students to predict (in writing) you have any questions?” provide the might need to be adjusted to meet what they expect to see and predict the lecturer little insight into whether or the learning styles of your students to effect of changing particular variables. not the audience actually compre- actively engage them in developing It is the act of predicting and rational- hends the ideas being presented. conceptual understanding. izing these predictions where most of An easy-to-understand yet dif- The first step toward refocusing the the learning occurs. So, stop and take ficult-to-implement teaching skill is teacher-centered lecture to a learner- the time to ask, “What do you think to ask meaningful questions and then centered classroom is to accept that you’ll see?” patiently WAIT. Researchers that care- much of the responsibility for learning Students in the most basic of learn- fully track classroom dynamics have resides squarely on the listener—not er-centered learning environments do found that an instructor who too on the lecturer. Lecturers can motivate, more than mindlessly recopy notes quickly provides clarifying informa- inspire, and build a series of experiences projected by the lecturer; they add tion or responds to the first person that make the discipline more acces- notations and fill in missing pieces who answers a question completely sible; but teachers cannot do the learn- to partially completed forms or dia- squashes further discussion and diver- ing for the students. This notion has grams distributed to audiences at the gent thinking. The common advice encouraged me to promote the perspec- beginning of a lecture. Rather than is to wait at least 10 seconds before THE PHYSICS TEACHER ◆ Vol. 46, May 2008 DOI: 10.1119/1.2909759 317 This article is copyrighted as indicated in the article. Reuse of AAPT content is subject to the terms at: http://scitation.aip.org/termsconditions. Downloaded to IP: 152.117.151.73 On: Mon, 31 Oct 2016 20:57:36 Teacher ”To Do” List for Creating Engaging Classroom Lectures To Do List How To Do It Better 1. Do find out what they know and use it as a bridge Start a lecture by asking the audience to write, then to what you are trying to teach them. share, responses to “what would you do if” questions before getting far into your lecture. 2. Do periodically stop and find out if they understand Periodically stop and give listeners Think-Pair-Share and give listeners feedback. questions. 3. Do give listeners a structure for how to follow your Provide PowerPoint handouts with ONLY the slide titles lecture. and images/graphs to which listeners can add notes. 4. Do have them work in teams on mini-case studies Ask groups to consider seemingly easy mini-case stud- with ill-defined variables. ies and elect a spokesperson to summarize analysis. saying anything after posing a ques- To capitalize on the innate social a meaningful task is one of the most tion. If everyone in the audience can nature of students, pose a multiple- successful and fully evaluated teach- answer your question in less than 10 choice question to students in a ing techniques implemented over the seconds, then the question isn’t con- think-pair-share format. Students are last century. Our experience is that ceptually challenging enough. One asked to THINK about the ques- the students will readily talk to one useful strategy to help fidgety lectur- tion and individually commit to and another and stay on task for several ers be certain that 10 seconds elapses vote on an answer. It is crucial that minutes at a time if the questions are before accepting responses is to turn people actually commit to an initial posed at the right conceptual level. away from the class, taking a sip of idea so that they can actively compare Engage collaborative learning groups coffee, or flip through lecture notes their initial thinking with any new in meaningful conversations by pro- without looking at the students. It is understandings that might result viding students with dilemmas to equally important to ask responders after discussion with a peer. The be solved through case studies. Case to explain the reasoning behind their second step is to PAIR with another study tasks ask audience members to answers and to avoid affirming the student and to SHARE their answer, synthesize several ideas or evaluate correctness of a response before ac- articulate the reasoning, and convince scenarios that have not been explic- cepting several other answers. their neighbor “why their answer is itly presented to them in the lecture. A lecturer must avoid holding a correct.” After a short collaborative The best case studies have an initial discussion with only the students in discussion, they are asked to respond appearance of being simplistic and the first few front rows. After just to the question a second time. We ask ask students to work at the highest a few sessions the students farther the audience to vote anonymously cognitive levels by challenging them back in the classroom realize that perhaps by holding one, two, three, to use their knowledge to create and questions without accountability or four fingers close to their chest to justify decisions as well as evaluate systems don’t actually need to be indicate their answers, using colored scenarios. contemplated because only the first or lettered index cards to indicate a The bottom line here is that the few rows are required to respond. To choice, or even use electronic peer- most valuable role of an expert is be effective, a system that holds all the response systems. The outcome of the not to simply tell students what they students accountable needs to be imple- voting allows the lecturer to monitor know; rather, it is to use their unique mented. Some lecturers draw names the audience’s conceptual growth. expertise to build rich scenarios for at random from a hat to ask specific The underlying hope is that through students to analyze using novel ideas.