What is Active Learning?
“Active learning” has been defined as “instructional activities involving students in doing things and thinking about what they are doing” (Bonwell & Eison, 1991). Proponents of active learning argue that in order for students to learn the class material, they must actively engage with the concepts and problems being taught through activities instead of passively listening to lectures. Active learning can be implemented in a number of ways and covers a broad range of activities, but it can generally be thought of as any activity in-class that requires students to do more than simply listen or take notes during the instructor’s lecture (Felder & Brent, 2016). Active learning activities can be as involved as the instructor wishes, making it an incredibly flexible and accessible tool for instructors at all levels and across all fields.
As outlined by Felder and Brent (2016) in their tutorial for active learning, students are asked to perform a course-related activity of some kind. They are then given time in class to complete the activity. Following this period of time, the instructor reconvenes the class by processing the students’ answers and then introduces new material. The authors also point out that it is likely professors are already using this approach in their course whether they recognize it as active learning or not. Activities such as breaking students into groups to work out a problem or come up with an example or having students present in class are active learning activities.
The effectiveness of active learning techniques has been a research topic of interest for decades now. Repeatedly, research has shown that incorporating active or collaborative learning into courses improves students’ objective and perceived class performance (Freeman et al., 2014; Terenzini et al., 2001), engagement and motivation (Blasco-Arcas, Buil, Hernández-Ortega, & Sese, 2013; Rotgans & Schmidt, 2011), and satisfaction with the course (Armbruster, Patel, Johnson, & Weiss, 2009; Lumpkin, Achen, & Dodd, 2015; Machemer & Crawford, 2006; but see Smith & Cardaciotto, 2011). Multiple reviews of the active learning literature within and across different fields have demonstrated the usefulness of the approach (see Hartikainen, Rintala, Pylväs, & Nokelainen, 2019; Michael, 2006; Prince, 2004; Talbert & Mor-Avi, 2018).
Strategies
Common active learning activity categories as outlined in Arthurs and Kreager, 2017:
Tips for use:
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Because active learning is a broad topic, it can be overwhelming to instructors, especially newer instructors, to implement. Feel free to start off small and slowly incorporate different active learning activities into your course.
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Find activities that work for you and your students. Not every active learning activity is appropriate for every course. There are many resources available with possible active learning activities. Seeking out these resources and educating yourself about active learning will improve the experience for both you and your students.
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Make sure to plan enough time for students to both complete the active learning activity and process the outcome of the activity.
Students are polled about something related to the course and work individually to answer the prompt. Some examples are: the minute paper (i.e., students have a minute to answer an open-ended question and are given feedback by the instructor; Angelo & Cross, 1993; 2012), building physical models of conceptual ideas, writing down experimental approaches to testing a certain hypothesis, etc.
Recent classroom technology developments have paved the way for easy class polling. Specifically, polling software like Poll Everywhere, allow students to quickly and easily answer questions and in some cases, have led to modest improvements on student performance (Caldwell, 2007; see Keough, 2012 for a review). Two key functions of in-class polling are: 1) to help students recognize the limits of their comprehension, and 2) provide insight to the instructor on class comprehension.
These types of active learning activities require everyone in the class to participate together. While initially they may start with an activity student complete on their own or in groups, it ends with a class discussion or class activity in which everyone participates. The class discussion/activity can be facilitated by either the students or the instructor.
As described by its name, in-class group activities requires groups of students to perform some kind of activity together during class time. The nature of the activity can vary depending on the goals of the course. Some examples of in-class group activities could be working through problem sets, group projects such as creating and running experiments, and jigsaws (i.e., when each group completes a different but connected assignment).
Active Learning Myths
Active learning is an incredibly flexible tool. Incorporating active learning into class time can be as quick and easy as polling the class with a few clicker questions and discussing the answers or as in-depth and long as a class project which takes an entire class period. The instructor can adapt active learning activities as much as they like to fit the course goals.
Simply taking notes or answering a question or two in class is NOT active learning. Active learning is when students are given time during class to perform a course-related activity and then reconvene to process the students’ final products from the activity (Felder & Brent, 2016).
The studies outlined above in the “How effective is active learning” section show how performance, satisfaction, and engagement and motivation improves in courses with active learning compared to courses where students listen to lectures and take notes. This demonstrably shows that note-taking is not the same as active learning.
For a list of references please click here.