Assessment and Active Learning Strategies for Introductory Geology Courses

Educational research findings suggest that instructors can foster the growth of thinking skills and promote science literacy by incorporating active learning strategies into the classroom. This paper describes a variety of such strategies that may be adopted in introductory geology courses to encourage the development of higher-order thinking skills, and provides directions for implementing these techniques in the classroom. It discusses six hierarchical levels of student learning and links them to examples of appropriate assessment tools that were used successfully in several sections of a general education Earth Science course taught by two instructors at the University of Akron. These teaching strategies have been evaluated qualitatively using peer reviews, student written evaluations and semistructured student interviews; and quantitatively by measuring improvements in student retention, exam scores, and scores on a logical thinking assessment instrument. Educational levels: Graduate or professional

How can I learn more when I collaborate in a virtual group?

Learning in virtual groups has been a process studied and analysed long from multiple perspectives. However, the literature is scarce when we look for models to explain information problem solving skills in online collaboration. A descriptive model of cognitive skills involved in individual information problem solving while using internet information can be found in recent research. The purpose of this study was to find out what information problem solving skills (IPS) students apply when working collaboratively online, and secondly, to analyse what differentiates students who do well on their knowledge tests after collaboration, in relation to these IPS skills. We conducted a research with more than 40 students in 10 virtual groups to analyse the correlation between learning and IPS skills applied by students during an online task that lasted more than 4 weeks. Students completed a weekly self-report with actions related to IPS skills and time devoted to the collaborative task. Findings show that students applied more frequently the skill to check the communication (30%), secondly, read de information (22%), in the third place exchange information (20%), followed by write the information (15%), analyze the information (8%), and finally, search for information (5%). However, only three skills correlate with learning: information exchange, analysis of information and checking communication. Two of them (exchange and check) are collaborative skills and one of them (analysis) is an information problem-solving skill. The conclusions of this study may provide guidelines for instructors and students on ways to improve learning in online collaborative group work

Evaluating Student Opinion of Constructivist Learning Activities on Computing Undergraduate Degrees

This paper discusses the student-focused learning activities employed by a number of computing lecturers at the University of Worcester to encourage learning amongst 2nd and 3rd year undergraduates. These activities include on-line discussions, variations on group discussion and presentational activities, students undertaking and analysing computer simulations, and the completion of a structured series of programming activities. The paper introduces the background to these learning activities, documents them and then analyses the approach adopted by members of staff. This is followed by a review of the feedback from both students and academic staff. Finally, the paper comments on the awareness of the academics of the term ‘Constructive Alignment’

Multi-Armed Bandits for Intelligent Tutoring Systems

We present an approach to Intelligent Tutoring Systems which adaptively personalizes sequences of learning activities to maximize skills acquired by students, taking into account the limited time and motivational resources. At a given point in time, the system proposes to the students the activity which makes them progress faster. We introduce two algorithms that rely on the empirical estimation of the learning progress, RiARiT that uses information about the difficulty of each exercise and ZPDES that uses much less knowledge about the problem. The system is based on the combination of three approaches. First, it leverages recent models of intrinsically motivated learning by transposing them to active teaching, relying on empirical estimation of learning progress provided by specific activities to particular students. Second, it uses state-of-the-art Multi-Arm Bandit (MAB) techniques to efficiently manage the exploration/exploitation challenge of this optimization process. Third, it leverages expert knowledge to constrain and bootstrap initial exploration of the MAB, while requiring only coarse guidance information of the expert and allowing the system to deal with didactic gaps in its knowledge. The system is evaluated in a scenario where 7-8 year old schoolchildren learn how to decompose numbers while manipulating money. Systematic experiments are presented with simulated students, followed by results of a user study across a population of 400 school children

Towards a quantitative evaluation of the relationship between the domain knowledge and the ability to assess peer work

In this work we present the preliminary results provided by the statistical modeling of the cognitive relationship between the knowledge about a topic a the ability to assess peer achievements on the same topic. Our starting point is Bloom's taxonomy of educational objectives in the cognitive domain, and our outcomes confirm the hypothesized ranking. A further consideration that can be derived is that meta-cognitive abilities (e.g., assessment) require deeper domain knowledge

Online discussion compensates for suboptimal timing of supportive information presentation in a digitally supported learning environment

This study used a sequential set-up to investigate the consecutive effects of timing of supportive information presentation (information before vs. information during the learning task clusters) in interactive digital learning materials (IDLMs) and type of collaboration (personal discussion vs. online discussion) in computer-supported collaborative learning (CSCL) on student knowledge construction. Students (N = 87) were first randomly assigned to the two information presentation conditions to work individually on a case-based assignment in IDLM. Students who received information during learning task clusters tended to show better results on knowledge construction than those who received information only before each cluster. The students within the two separate information presentation conditions were then randomly assigned to pairs to discuss the outcomes of their assignments under either the personal discussion or online discussion condition in CSCL. When supportive information had been presented before each learning task cluster, online discussion led to better results than personal discussion. When supportive information had been presented during the learning task clusters, however, the online and personal discussion conditions had no differential effect on knowledge construction. Online discussion in CSCL appeared to compensate for suboptimal timing of presentation of supportive information before the learning task clusters in IDLM