Rice conference presents proven concepts for improved teaching

BY LIN FISH
Special to Rice News

”The big problem is that students are not learning as much as we’d like, and they aren’t enjoying learning.” Robert Beichner made this assessment at Rice University’s Feb. 11-12 Scientia Conference, which examined the state of the art in education in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM). Titled ”Research and Innovation in Undergraduate Natural Science and Engineering,” the conference brought eight respected American scholars in STEM education to Houston to detailed their efforts to improve teaching and advance learning in undergraduate courses in an area seen as critical to the nation’s economic future and international competitiveness.

	JEFF FITLOW
	Robert Beichner, the Alumni Distinguished Professor of Physics at North Carolina State University, Raleigh, spoke at Rice’s Feb. 11-12 Scientia Conference, which examined the state of the art in education in science, technology, engineering and math.

Today’s students are ”digital natives” whose lifelong use of technology affects how they think and learn, said Beichner, the Alumni Distinguished Professor of Physics at North Carolina State University, Raleigh. For example, students use cell phone cameras to capture class notes. They print them out and add their notes to those a professor projects on a screen.

Search engines provide information instantly, organized by what one is likely to want. A simple search for ”Google” lists more than 2 billion hits in less than one second. Having so much information readily available changes the game for teachers, Beichner said. Information used to be scarce and a teacher was the authority; that’s no longer the case.

”If your primary contribution to learning is delivering information, you can and you will be replaced,” he said. ”There are better ways to deliver content than to lecture to people.”

Beichner’s advice: ”Play your trump card.” Research has shown that the most important variable in student success is people, he said. Social interaction among students and with teachers is an “active ingredient” in learning and retention. ”They can’t get that online.” With instruction increasingly offered via the Web, the advantage of real people building relationships in the classroom makes a big difference.

His approach — SCALE-UP, or Student-Centered Active Learning Environment for Undergraduate Programs — combines classroom design and technology with team learning. The idea is to give students something interesting to investigate. While they work in teams, the instructor may roam the classroom, asking questions, sending one team to help another or asking why different teams get different answers. Most of the “lectures” are actually classwide discussions.

This program has been adopted at more than 100 leading American institutions as a way to keep students engaged.

Redesigned classrooms for 100 students or more can promote active learning if spaces are carefully designed to encourage interaction among teams of students. Years of research on room design demonstrate that round tables seven feet in diameter work best, and they are the most important technology in the room, according to Beichner.

Three teams of three students each work at round tables. Every team has a laptop in case it needs Web access. Whiteboards on nearby walls are used to capture and share ideas.

Students work while teachers coach. This requires extensive preparation by students, who read assigned chapters and complete simple homework before they come to class, where they ask questions and work together on interesting activities.

A decade of research shows significant improvements in learning using SCALE UP, not only in science, technology, math and engineering programs, but also in music, literature and history.

Beichner’s research showed that physics students at all levels benefited from this pedagogy, with students at the top of the class learning the most.

Funded by The DeLange Conferences, the biennial Scientia Conference featured eight respected American scholars in science, technology, engineering and math education. They offered the latest thinking about how students learn and how professors should teach, based on research of the past decade. In the conference’s innovative format, each presenter spoke briefly on a specific new pedagogical approach; conference participants then experienced that approach in a breakout session led by that speaker.

Planners expect the conference to inspire innovation at Rice and a continuing conversation about teaching excellence. The free conference also was offered to university and community college faculty as well as area K-12 teachers.

All of the Scientia presentations are archived at http://webcast.rice.edu. For more information about SCALE-UP, visit http://scaleup.ncsu.edu.