Creating learning environments that promote active learning, critical thinking, collaborative learning, and knowledge creation

After months of spirited discussion and debate, the EDUCAUSE teaching and learning community has named the, “Top Teaching and Learning Challenges, 2009.” Now it’s time to roll up your sleeves and contribute ideas from your vantage point on campus to build a network of solutions around each challenge. Share the ways that your campus is combating the Challenges in the wiki below or simply peruse suggestions from your peers to find ideas that might inspire change at your institution.

Before posting to this wiki, be sure to read the Community Wiki Guidelines developed by lead project contributors. Using the guidelines helps to ensure consistent format and usability of this collection. If you have difficulty posting or have any questions, please contact the workspace manager assigned to this wiki. They can post content for you or answer any questions you may have about contributing.

To explore the other Challenges, return to the main wiki and connect with colleagues in the Challenges Ning network.

Workspace Managers

Karin Moyano Camihort, karin@acad.umass.edu

Eva Fernández, eva.fernandez@qc.cuny.edu

Challenge Overview

As we discover more about the way that people learn, how can we evolve our conversations about learning environments to reflect learning that is active, inquiry driven, and focused on knowledge creation? How do we build classroom ecologies that encourage students to think critically and work together?

Can we move outside the box of a four-walled classroom to begin developing learning environments that take advantage of the content offered in both the physical and virtual worlds?

Campus Snapshots

Immersing Faculty in Smart Classrooms at the University of California, Santa Barbara

The Gevirtz Graduate School of Education (GGSE) Instructional Technology Group (ITG) at the University of California, Santa Barbara, has provided faculty with a “next generation smart classroom” to use and experiment with current hardware, software, and functional room controls to improve the teaching/learning process prior to the installation of classrooms in the new Gevirtz Graduate School of Education building, opening in the summer of 2009. These technology-rich rooms included multiple short throw interactive whiteboards, “huddle” boards, document cameras, student response “clickers,” multiple computer control panels (for up to three projection stations), as well as a faculty development and training program, ongoing faculty support with a graduate assistant in technology use, regular faculty demonstration colloquia, moveable furniture, and facilitated faculty user groups. Faculty have commented that using the ‘smart’ rooms has changed their teaching, increased opportunities for student engagement, improved the use of open ended project and problem-based learning, and allowed for significantly greater opportunity for student learning and building meaning. (Contact: Patrick Faverty, pfaverty@education.ucsb.edu)

(This solution was featured in a recent article in the EDUCAUSE Review, Charting the Course and Tapping the Community: The | EDUCAUSE Top Teaching and Learning Challenges, 2009.)

A Space for Production and Creativity on Campus at Bucks County Community College

In support of students and faculty working on alternative assignment options, the Learning Resources team at Bucks County Community College is developing MInD Space (Media and INstructional Design), a learning environment that will offer a collaborative workspace, along with tools and resources (both tangible and virtual) for students and faculty. It will draw on expertise and innovation from students, librarians, instructional designers, and multimedia staff members. Faculty members have had access to an Instructional Design Lab, but unless students have enrolled in cinema/video production classes, they have had nowhere to go to collaborate or to borrow or get help in using production and editing tools. MInDSpace will change that, as students will find it easier to engage in learning and knowledge creation with tools and resources in this collaborative learning environment. (Contact: Maureen McCreaddie, mccreadi@bucks.edu)

Supporting Blended Learning at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee

The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee developed the Blending Life and Learning initiative to offer degree and certificate programs with flexible class schedules which combine face-to-face, fully online, and blended courses. Blended courses replace a portion of traditional face-to-face classroom time with online assignments and activities. The UWM Learning Technology Center provides faculty with opportunities to develop their courses for blended teaching and learning. In blended courses, instructors have found that their role as teacher becomes more facilitative and learner-centered. As faculty move to active, student-centered teaching and learning, we suggest methods of authentic assessment which apply to the instructor's own disciplinary and programmatic needs, and focus on critical thinking. We advise faculty on ways to promote engagement both online and in the f2f classroom, particularly with the goal of developing a peer learning community that employs collaboration to complete its learning activities. Students are enabled to develop higher-order skills of critical thinking, problem-solving, and are challenged to apply theoretical models to real-world data. (Contact: Tanya Joosten, tjoosten@uwm.edu)

(This solution was featured in a recent article in the EDUCAUSE Review, Charting the Course and Tapping the Community: The | EDUCAUSE Top Teaching and Learning Challenges, 2009.)

Active, collaborative inquiry for large enrollment courses at North Carolina State University

SCALE-UP is a learning environment specifically created to facilitate active, collaborative learning in a studio-like setting. Some people think the rooms look more like restaurants than classrooms. The spaces are carefully designed to facilitate interactions between teams of students who work on short, interesting tasks. A decade of research indicates significant improvements in learning, with failure rates falling to 1/4 and 1/5 the rates seen in lectures to minorities and women. Although originating at NC State University, at least 80 colleges across the US and around the world have directly adopted the SCALE-UP model and adapted it to their particular needs.

The SCALE-UP name stands for “Student-Centered Active Learning Environment for Undergraduate Programs.” The basic idea is that students are given something interesting to investigate. While they work in teams on these "tangibles" (hands-on measurements or observations), "ponderables" (interesting, complex problems), and "visibles" (3-D simulations developed by the students themselves) the instructor is free to roam around the classroom–--asking questions, sending one team to help another, or asking why someone else got a different answer. There is no separate lab class and most of the "lectures" are actually class-wide discussions. The groups are carefully structured and give students many opportunities to interact. Three teams (labelled a, b, and c) sit at each round table and have white boards nearby. Each team has a laptop in case they need web access. The original called for 11 tables of nine students, but many schools have smaller classes while a few have even larger ones.

(This solution was featured in the Educause book Learning Spaces, in chapter 29.)

Community Solutions

<<Hyperlink to Location of Document, Institution, Contributor, Contact>>

Multimedia

<<Hyperlink to Location, Creator, Institution>>

Brainstorming Sessions

Tools in the Field

<<Title of Tool, Reviewer, Institution, Short Description, Contact Information>>

Experts List

<<Name, Institution or Association, Email, Topic>>

Robert Beichner, North Carolina State University, beichner@ncsu.edu, SCALE-UP (Student-Centered Active Learning Environment for Undergraduate Programs) which is a studio-based means of supporting interactive, collaborative inquiry http://scaleup.ncsu.edu

Vivian Lewis M.A., M.L.S. Associate University Librarian Organizational Analysis, Plannning & Accountability Mills Library, Room 204 McMaster University (905) 525-9140, ext. 23883 lewisvm@mcmaster.ca

Key Readings

<<Title Hyperlinked to Location, Year, Author or Organization>>

“The SCALE-UP Project: A Student-Centered, Active Learning Environment for Undergraduate Programs,” (2008). R. Beichner, National Academy of Sciences.

Community Community		Learning_Environments Creating learning environments that promote active learning, critical thinking, collaborative learning, and knowledge creation After months of spirited discussion and debate, the EDUCAUSE teaching and learning community has named the, “Top Teaching and Learning Challenges, 2009.” Now it’s time to roll up your sleeves and contribute ideas from your vantage point on campus to build a network of solutions around each challenge. Share the ways that your campus is combating the Challenges in the wiki below or simply peruse suggestions from your peers to find ideas that might inspire change at your institution. Before posting to this wiki, be sure to read the Community Wiki Guidelines developed by lead project contributors. Using the guidelines helps to ensure consistent format and usability of this collection. If you have difficulty posting or have any questions, please contact the workspace manager assigned to this wiki. They can post content for you or answer any questions you may have about contributing. To explore the other Challenges, return to the main wiki and connect with colleagues in the Challenges Ning network. Workspace Managers Karin Moyano Camihort, karin@acad.umass.edu Eva Fernández, eva.fernandez@qc.cuny.edu Challenge Overview As we discover more about the way that people learn, how can we evolve our conversations about learning environments to reflect learning that is active, inquiry driven, and focused on knowledge creation? How do we build classroom ecologies that encourage students to think critically and work together? Can we move outside the box of a four-walled classroom to begin developing learning environments that take advantage of the content offered in both the physical and virtual worlds? Campus Snapshots *Immersing Faculty in Smart Classrooms at the University of California, Santa Barbara* The Gevirtz Graduate School of Education (GGSE) Instructional Technology Group (ITG) at the University of California, Santa Barbara, has provided faculty with a “next generation smart classroom” to use and experiment with current hardware, software, and functional room controls to improve the teaching/learning process prior to the installation of classrooms in the new Gevirtz Graduate School of Education building, opening in the summer of 2009. These technology-rich rooms included multiple short throw interactive whiteboards, “huddle” boards, document cameras, student response “clickers,” multiple computer control panels (for up to three projection stations), as well as a faculty development and training program, ongoing faculty support with a graduate assistant in technology use, regular faculty demonstration colloquia, moveable furniture, and facilitated faculty user groups. Faculty have commented that using the ‘smart’ rooms has changed their teaching, increased opportunities for student engagement, improved the use of open ended project and problem-based learning, and allowed for significantly greater opportunity for student learning and building meaning. (Contact: Patrick Faverty, pfaverty@education.ucsb.edu) (This solution was featured in a recent article in the EDUCAUSE Review, Charting the Course and Tapping the Community: The \| EDUCAUSE Top Teaching and Learning Challenges, 2009.) *A Space for Production and Creativity on Campus at Bucks County Community College* In support of students and faculty working on alternative assignment options, the Learning Resources team at Bucks County Community College is developing MInD Space (Media and INstructional Design), a learning environment that will offer a collaborative workspace, along with tools and resources (both tangible and virtual) for students and faculty. It will draw on expertise and innovation from students, librarians, instructional designers, and multimedia staff members. Faculty members have had access to an Instructional Design Lab, but unless students have enrolled in cinema/video production classes, they have had nowhere to go to collaborate or to borrow or get help in using production and editing tools. MInDSpace will change that, as students will find it easier to engage in learning and knowledge creation with tools and resources in this collaborative learning environment. (Contact: Maureen McCreaddie, mccreadi@bucks.edu) *Supporting Blended Learning at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee* The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee developed the Blending Life and Learning initiative to offer degree and certificate programs with flexible class schedules which combine face-to-face, fully online, and blended courses. Blended courses replace a portion of traditional face-to-face classroom time with online assignments and activities. The UWM Learning Technology Center provides faculty with opportunities to develop their courses for blended teaching and learning. In blended courses, instructors have found that their role as teacher becomes more facilitative and learner-centered. As faculty move to active, student-centered teaching and learning, we suggest methods of authentic assessment which apply to the instructor's own disciplinary and programmatic needs, and focus on critical thinking. We advise faculty on ways to promote engagement both online and in the f2f classroom, particularly with the goal of developing a peer learning community that employs collaboration to complete its learning activities. Students are enabled to develop higher-order skills of critical thinking, problem-solving, and are challenged to apply theoretical models to real-world data. (Contact: Tanya Joosten, tjoosten@uwm.edu) (This solution was featured in a recent article in the EDUCAUSE Review, Charting the Course and Tapping the Community: The \| EDUCAUSE Top Teaching and Learning Challenges, 2009.) Active, collaborative inquiry for large enrollment courses at North Carolina State University SCALE-UP is a learning environment specifically created to facilitate active, collaborative learning in a studio-like setting. Some people think the rooms look more like restaurants than classrooms. The spaces are carefully designed to facilitate interactions between teams of students who work on short, interesting tasks. A decade of research indicates significant improvements in learning, with failure rates falling to 1/4 and 1/5 the rates seen in lectures to minorities and women. Although originating at NC State University, at least 80 colleges across the US and around the world have directly adopted the SCALE-UP model and adapted it to their particular needs. The SCALE-UP name stands for “Student-Centered Active Learning Environment for Undergraduate Programs.” The basic idea is that students are given something interesting to investigate. While they work in teams on these "tangibles" (hands-on measurements or observations), "ponderables" (interesting, complex problems), and "visibles" (3-D simulations developed by the students themselves) the instructor is free to roam around the classroom–--asking questions, sending one team to help another, or asking why someone else got a different answer. There is no separate lab class and most of the "lectures" are actually class-wide discussions. The groups are carefully structured and give students many opportunities to interact. Three teams (labelled a, b, and c) sit at each round table and have white boards nearby. Each team has a laptop in case they need web access. The original called for 11 tables of nine students, but many schools have smaller classes while a few have even larger ones. (This solution was featured in the Educause book Learning Spaces, in chapter 29.) Community Solutions <<Hyperlink to Location of Document, Institution, Contributor, Contact>> Multimedia <<Hyperlink to Location, Creator, Institution>> Brainstorming Sessions Images of brainstorming in action Discussion Session at the Southwest Regional Conference Discussion Session at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Conference Learning Circle at the 2009 ELI Annual Meeting Brainstorming at the 2008 EDUCAUSE Annual Meeting Tools in the Field <<Title of Tool, Reviewer, Institution, Short Description, Contact Information>> Experts List <<Name, Institution or Association, Email, Topic>> Robert Beichner, North Carolina State University, beichner@ncsu.edu, SCALE-UP (Student-Centered Active Learning Environment for Undergraduate Programs) which is a studio-based means of supporting interactive, collaborative inquiry http://scaleup.ncsu.edu Vivian Lewis M.A., M.L.S. Associate University Librarian Organizational Analysis, Plannning & Accountability Mills Library, Room 204 McMaster University (905) 525-9140, ext. 23883 lewisvm@mcmaster.ca Key Readings <<Title Hyperlinked to Location, Year, Author or Organization>> “The SCALE-UP Project: A Student-Centered, Active Learning Environment for Undergraduate Programs,” (2008). R. Beichner, National Academy of Sciences. Login or register to post comments
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