Motivating students - resources, tips, considerations

It is the week after spring break, the halfway mark for the spring semester, and campus is back in the swing of things.  Well, everyone is back, but the level of motivation might not be what is was at the beginning of the semester.

In looking around for some suggestions for instructors on motivating students in the middle of the semester, I first stumbled on a wealth of advice and thoughts on the "mid-semester slump" geared towards students.  So, instructors, the first thing to keep in mind is that the lower level of motivation and enthusiasm that you are sensing in the classroom midway through the semester may be much more general than it feels initially.  Don't take it personally!  The middle of the semester often coincides with a change in the weather and, in the case of the weeks following spring break, the challenge of transitioning back to a more regimented schedule when summer is just weeks away.  

There are a number of great suggestions out there for instructors who want to make adjustments in an effort to improve students' motivation.  However, much of this advice is best suited for the beginning of a new semester.  The Center for Teaching + Learning at University of Texas, for example, offers some excellent advice for motivating and engaging students; Student Engagement Techniques: A Handbook for College Faculty by Elizabeth F. Barkley is another great resource.  Unless your class is facing a dire situation, however, modifying core, foundational details of the course (how grades are determined, learning objectives, etc.) is more likely to lead to frustrated rather than motivated students.

So what is an instructor to do when it is the middle of the semester?

Here are a couple of resources that may be helpful at any point during the semester:

"Solve a Teaching Problem" tool from the Eberly Center at Carnegie Mellon

In Step 1, a list of possible issues is presented; the top of the list focuses on issues related to attitudes and motivation.  Clicking on any one of the options will produce a list of possible reasons for what you are observing (Step 2) which then leads to some ways of addressing the problem (Step 3).  For example, does it seem like students lack interest or motivation?  One possible reason (out of six that are provided) is the variety of other priorities that compete for students' attention.  These selections lead to four possible strategies in Step 3; out of these strategies to explore, at least three, if not all four, can be reasonably implemented in the middle of the semester.

"Motivating Students" from the Teaching Effectiveness Program at University of Oregon

This list of FAQs includes a number of inquiries that coordinate with what we see in the classroom in the middle of the semester including some suggestions for working with groups are no longer collaborating successfully, elevating student interest in the material, and increasing the odds of students reading or preparing prior to class meetings.

Hopefully one of these tools will provide you with an idea worth implementing as you attempt to counteract that mid-semester slump!  

  

Reference

Barkley, E. F. (2010). Student engagement techniques: A handbook for college faculty. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Strategies for lectures in an active learning classroom

Is it ok to lecture in an active learning class or classroom?  Absolutely.  A short lecture can be used to present background information that students will analyze or assemble as part of an activity.  Or, instead, students may be confused and in need of clarification and guidance in order to move forward with confidence.  These are just two out of many reasons why a lecture may be a beneficial component of a class, even one that meets in an active learning classroom.

Strategies for improving the effectiveness of lectures, regardless of classroom, center on breaking up the lecture into digestible pieces (~15 minutes or less) that are interspersed with short activities that engage students.  And by short, we're talking 2-6 minutes!  Johnston and Cooper (1997) offer eight different "Quick-thinks," a few of which are highlighted below.  See the full list of Quick-thinks, with examples, reprinted with permission by Tomorrow's Professor on this page.

Overview of select Quick-thinks from Johnston and Cooper (1997):

• Select the best response

This may be the quickest of the Quick-thinks as long as you have some multiple choice questions on hand.  Don't be tempted to identify the correct answer right away though!  Give the students some time to grapple with the options and why one of the options is the best out of the bunch.  I often used old test questions for this sort of exercise in my lower-level classes and found that some of the distractors provided much-needed opportunities to address misunderstandings or preconceived notions.

• Complete a sentence starter

The sentence starter can be simple and focused on recall (e.g., List the three main points of...), ask students to apply information from the lecture (e.g., Predict what will happen if...), or even venture into analysis (e.g., ______ is in direct contrast to ______ because ______).

• Reorder the steps

Great option for anything process-oriented.  Provide students with the name of each step but in a random order and provide them with 2-3 minutes to put the steps in the correct order.  

• Paraphrase the idea

Ask students to express an important idea, statement, or argument from the lecture in their own words.  Johnston and Cooper (1997) recommend also identifying the audience for the rephrased content, e.g., classmate, internship supervisor, parent.

The physical setup of an active learning classroom, however, may pose some challenges to delivering a lecture.  The active learning classrooms are clearly set up with students working and communicating in groups as the default setup - great for group activities, but creates a challenge when a central focal point is desired.  This is not a UWEC-specific issue; University of Minnesota describes the lack of a central focal point as a potential consideration for instructors in active learning rooms, and I agree with the recommendations to:

• use amplification - so important when some students are facing away from you!
• provide students with a cue to shift focus from groups to instructor and/or screen.

All active learning classrooms at UWEC are equipped with a wireless lapel mic, so amplification is available.  Believe me, I'm not a microphone person, but the mic's impact is noticeable to those in the room, especially those seated facing away from the instructor.  It is a worth a try!

Note, also, that these two recommendations can be one in the same.  The cue for students to transition from interaction within the group to something being presented to/shared with the whole class could be an announcement by the instructor using the microphone.  Communicate this - or any cue - with students in advance so that they know what to look and/or listen for!

Reference

Johnston, S., & Cooper, J. (1997). Quick-thinks: Active thinking in lecture classes and televised instruction. Cooperative Learning and College Teaching, 8(1), 2-6.

Quick activities to get students talking with each other

Our campus was fortunate enough to have Dr. Christine Harrington on campus last month for a series of workshops.  An active learning classroom turned out to be a good fit for Christine's lively, participant-centered style of workshop delivery; the fact that each session was peppered with a variety of classroom activities turned out to be an added bonus of being a workshop participant.  A few of my favorite activities from the sessions are shared below.  Each activity described here makes use of index cards but small pieces of scratch paper are likely to work just as well.  (UWEC instructors - stop by Printing Services in Schofield 18 to pick up free pads of pre-cut scratch paper.)

Five Card Pass (in 5 minutes or less)

Provide students with a prompt (answer a question, make a list, etc.) and 1-2 minutes to write down their anonymous response on an index card.  With everyone out of their seats, students then exchange cards five times - the exchanges have to be with classmates that are not sitting at their pod/table.  The cards (and ideas) have now been randomly shuffled, so to speak, and students can be asked to do a number of things with the info on their new card - add, discuss, find an example, respond, etc. 

Brainwriting (5-10 minutes)

Provide students with a prompt, index cards, and 1-2 minutes to respond with one item or detail, writing it at the top of the card.  Next, instruct students to pass the index card to the right and write down another item/detail on the card that is now in front of them.  Same prompt, but the response must be unique - i.e., it cannot be the same as one written or read on other cards.  Continue passing and responding until the time is up or the possibilities have been exhausted.  

A more thorough overview of brainwriting is available on the Knowledge Sharing Toolkit wiki.  For an argument in favor of using brainwriting, check out this video from the Kellogg School of Management - it also highlights a variation of the brainwriting exercise described above.

Save the Last Word for Me (10-15 minutes)

This activity is designed to give everyone in the group a chance to be heard and practice listening skills.  Plus, it gives students something to do with an assigned reading and gets them talking (with each other!) about it.  See more information about this activity on The Teacher Toolkit site.

Often times, students are accustomed to directing questions, comments, responses, etc. to the instructor and need an extra nudge to, instead, exchange ideas with one another.  The activities shared here are relatively low-prep ways to get students engaging with one another in the classroom - and each has the possibility of being implemented in 15 minutes or less.  Perfect for getting students talking with one another with little preparation and each of these activities can be adapted to a wide variety of topics, prompts, and readings.

"Teaching without learning is just talking."

This statement, found on p.3 of Classroom Assessment Techniques by Angelo and Cross, adequately describes my fear when I end up speaking for an extended amount of time in class.  My fear was realized last week when my mini-lecture breached the 15 minute mark, taking up close to a third of the class period.

It is worth pointing out that I am not a lecturer by nature.  Speaking in front of people used to be a dealbreaker for me, and while it is no longer at the top of the list of things that make me uncomfortable, I simply lose interest in hearing myself speak.  I am interested in hearing what other people have to add, what questions are lingering in the room, and whether or not people have a sense of how to move forward with the information.   The mini-lecture, which is an abbreviated, focused lecture (I tend to aim for 7-10 minutes), is definitely my preferred approach when there is information to share.

My rambling "mini"-lecture left me feeling guilty - sheepish might be a better descriptor - after class that day, primarily because we ran out of time to finish one of our activities.  I spent two days (over)analyzing the situation and decided a discussion with the students was warranted.  (Did that extended lecture work for them?  Why or why not?)  The students were greeted with the graphic found on p.139 of Barkley's Student Engagement Techniques (below) on the large projector screens as they walked into class, and the first few minutes of class were spent discussing whether or not they agreed with the summary presented in the pie chart.  

Average Retention Rates from Different Teaching Methods;
Pie chart from Barkley, 2010, p.139; data from Sousa, 2006, p.95

The discussion started with small groups, and then the students were invited to share what they heard from others at their table.  Comments about several "slices" of the pie were offered; the conversation started with the 4% average retention rate associated with reading and then it moved on to details coordinating with the audiovisual category.  When I prompted for some thoughts on the 2% average retention rate reported for lecture, a student courageously raised his hand, and I nervously awaited the response.  

"We decided that it depends on what happens after the lecture."

The relief washed over me when I heard this statement.  He continued:

"The lecture on Monday worked for us because we did something after it.  You know, something that used the information, so we could try it right away.  That helped us figure out whether we understood it or not."

It is one thing to read through the literature and to understand, as an instructor, the importance of this approach to teaching and learning, but it is even more powerful to hear this outlook directly from the students.

In hindsight, I often feel guilty for having lectures, even mini-lectures, prepared for anything since we meet in an Active Learning Classroom which, by its very design, presents challenges to the traditional lecture.  However, if those mini-lectures paired with activities are working for the students, then there is no need to avoid them.

References

Angelo, T. A., and Cross, K. P. (1993). Classroom assessment techniques: A handbook for college teachers (2nd ed.). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Barkley, E. F. (2010). Student engagement techniques: A handbook for college faculty. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Sousa, D. A. (2006). How the brain learns. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin.

Achieving "flow" with classroom activities

What factors affect whether or not students engage with an activity in the classroom?  The level of challenge associated with the activity is is one factor.  Another factor is the difficulty level of the coordinating content.  The combination of these two factors is also important.  If the activity and the content are both too easy, then students will be bored, disengaged.  If the challenge level of both the activity and the coordinating material are high, then students may give up or, worse, not even try.

The goal is for students to be engaged with the material through the activity.  This immersion is sometimes referred to as "flow" - I have been intrigued with the simplicity of this idea since hearing about it in a workshop a few weeks ago (see discussion, for example, in this short article from the Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley).  Joel, our workshop presenter, pointed out that "flow" can be achieved by balancing complex with simple.  There are two basic pairings for classroom activities: (1) complex material with a simple activity, and (2) a more complex activity with material that is relatively simple.  Using the "Active Learning Continuum" conceptual framework as discussed by Bonwell and Sutherland (1996), a simple activity is one that is short in length and relatively unstructured while a complex activity can be described as one that is highly structured and has a longer duration.

Conceptual framework known as the "Active Learning Continuum" introduced by Bonwell and Sutherland (1996).

Pairing Complex Material with a Simple Activity
If students are being asked to dig into brand new material as part of an activity, then it might be wise to select an activity with easy instructions and/or one with a short list of tasks.  Learning new material often requires close attention, so a relatively easy activity allows students to focus on learning the content instead of learning the steps required as part of the activity. Classic examples of activities that are not-too-complex include brainstorming sessions, Think-Pair-Share, structured discussions (in which questions are provided), and a short writing assignment, e.g., Minute Paper.

"Flow" is achieved when complex is balanced with simple.  Either a simple activity for complex material or a complex activity paired with relatively simple material.

Complex Activity Paired with Material that is Relatively Simple

Drawing on our own personal experiences and review are two occasions when material is, generally speaking, "simple."  These are the times to pull out the activities that require a great deal of time and/or structure, including concept mapping, presentations, and debates.  When the material is familiar, students can focus on completing the tasks associated with complex activities.  

The simplicity of "flow" combined with the research documenting its potential for deeper learning is powerful.  This is my first introduction to the work of psychologist Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi, who is credited with coining the term "flow," but I plan on digging in some more.  

Reference

Bonwell, C.C. and Sutherland, T.E. (1996), The active learning continuum: Choosing activities to engage students in the classroom. New Directions for Teaching and Learning, 1996: 3–16. 

What I learned from my first week teaching in an active learning classroom

In short: The active learning room changes almost everything.

I listened to our instructors who shared their experiences last semester, and I heard what they were saying, including:

• The environment is great for students working in small groups. 
• Even better if the students have something to do/work on together.
• Planning, organization, and clear instructions are a must for activities (and takes a lot of prep time!).
• Groups finish at different rates so need to have something planned for those who finish earlier.
• The teacher station being located in the middle of the room is a new experience to get used to.
• Students' attention is focused inward to what is happening at or in their groups/pods.
• Giving a lecture, even a mini one, can be a challenge (see all of the above for explanation as to why!).

I never doubted a word of this feedback, but it is a completely new thing to experience them myself.  I took these to heart when planning for the first day, and it went well.  Overall we used just about everything available to us - technology, group workstations, whiteboards, open space (for our mixer); we brainstormed, discussed, located info, reported out.  It felt like we pretty much did it all and that it went smoothly.

And then there was Day 2.

Let's just say that things didn't go according to plan.  A mixture of things contributed to Day 2 not living up to my expectations, and I have been mulling it all over since 12:50pm on Friday.  Here are what I believe to be some contributing factors (sharing just in case it becomes useful for others):

• Too much was planned for a 50-minute period.
• The questions I posed to the class were too many and not strategic enough.
• A pod computer died in the midst of a group activity, leaving one group stranded since the activity relied on each group being able to display on the monitor located at the pod.  This threw off the rhythm more than I expected it too.
• A student's input seemed to be a conversation killer following what was otherwise a useful brainstorming session.  (And in hindsight, of course, I realize I could have recovered better!)

I spent the weekend brainstorming ideas of my own: structure for class meeting times, classroom management, clearer ways to present instructions.  I know that it is possible for an active learning-based class to run smoothly - luckily I have insights from colleagues here on campus and my own first day experience to build on.  I am convinced that the planning and organizing is key.  Maybe I had fallen out of practice with doing this because my classes had hit a rhythm of sorts over the past few years; often times I could walk into the classroom armed with a couple of old standby _____ (fill in the blank here: applications, problems to solve, news headlines to analyze, data set to manipulate) and go with the flow.  Perhaps part of me figured that it is still the same content and structure (hybrid/blended) so this semester would be more about ramping up the student engagement and involvement that I have been working to incorporate over the past few years.  It is so much more.  In some ways I feel like I am new to teaching again even though it has been nearly ten years since I started.  (The level of detail I am now planning out reminds me of the days when I used to note when to use the overhead projector vs. chalkboard - just 5-6 years ago! - and how to transition.)  It is very possible that the Day 2 experience is exactly what I needed - a swift kick in the pants to make the rest of the semester as successful as possible.

Today, Day 3, was better.  Back on the upswing.  Days 4 and 5 will be even better.  It takes time to get a feel for what works best in the space during our allotted class time.  I will share a bit more about what worked (and what didn't) during Week 2 once it is complete.

*It is worth noting that if I would have reacted as if Day 2 was how it was always going to be in an active learning-based class, with group work, in that particular classroom, it wouldn't be very appealing to continue.  I am convinced that all days don't have to be like Day 2.  For me, at this time, it is worth it to keep trying, to find the balance between planning out class meetings - every activity (well, every 5 minutes of class time, really) - and going with the flow.  

Instructional Strategies & Learning Objectives

This post is part of an ongoing conversation about planning an active learning-based class for Fall 2014; the initial post outlines some priorities for the next few weeks, and a second post discusses some possible plans for the first class meeting.

Planning is key for successful active learning sessions.  As I mentioned last week, I am in the midst of planning class meetings for a course with content that is familiar, but this will be the first semester the class meets in an active learning classroom; as a result, I am in the midst of identifying appropriate activities and instructional strategies for various topics.  In doing so, I stumbled across this page from Carnegie Mellon which summarizes some commonly used instructional strategies with links to additional information and considerations.  A bonus is that coordinating learning objectives are listed alongside the instructional methods.  So, if you already have a sense of the goal for a particular topic, lesson, or class meeting but are still looking for ideas on how to approach it, this might be of some help.  Alternatively, if you already know of a great approach for a particular topic, this could help streamline the process of identifying an appropriate learning objective.

Note: The entire Design & Teach a Course site from the Eberly Center at Carnegie Mellon is a great resource - not to mention the other available categories (technology, assessment, solve a teaching problem, etc.).

Bonwell and Sutherland (1996) describe active learning activities as lying along a continuum; tasks range from simple to complex.  Plus, active learning activities can be mixed in with existing instructional strategies (e.g., lecturing and Q&A) and introduced gradually.  These are helpful details to keep in mind, especially if active learning is a new adventure.  Someone who already has lectures prepared, for example, can break a 45-minute lecture into three smaller mini-lectures, pausing after each mini-lecture to allow students to review notes in pairs or small groups.  Bonwell and Sutherland (1996) identify this "pause procedure" as an example of a simple active learning task; it could also be paired with a Q&A session (in the spirit of "Think-Pair-Share") and/or a short exercise requiring students to apply the information from the mini-lecture.  Abruptly switching instructional strategies is not required or even recommended.  Instead, the number of (or complexity level of) active learning activities can be increased over time, whether that is within a single semester or across semesters.

Reference:

Bonwell, C. C., and T. E. Sutherland (1996). The active learning continuum: Choosing activities to engage students in the classroom. New Directions for Teaching and Learning, 1996 (67), 3-16.