Editor’s note: The following article is part of a resource collection called It’s Worth Discussing, in which we feature research articles that are especially suitable for personal reflection and group discussion with your colleagues.
Why this article is worth discussing: A lot of us would wholeheartedly agree that active learning works. We have some familiarity with the research that supports it, and we’ve seen its positive effects in our classrooms. Done well, it engages students and overcomes the passivity that lectures regularly produce. John Dewey was right; students learn by doing better than by listening. So, we think we know the answer to the question, but this article challenges that assumption. It explores definitions of active learning, its intensity, how it’s delivered, and how its effects are assessed. It’s predicated on the assumption that we don’t know as much about active learning as we need to know. That’s the reason it’s an article worth discussing.
The article
Bernstein, D. A. (2018). Does active learning work? A good question, but not the right one. Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Psychology, 4(4), 290–307. https://doi.org/10.1037/stl0000124
A synopsis
The crux of Bernstein’s argument lies in the subtitle. He
contends that we aren’t asking the right question about active learning. We
have to stop assuming active learning improves student performance no matter
what the content, course level, or teacher’s and students’ characteristics. Rather
than putting the question in a global context, we need to make it one that
teachers address individually: Which active learning methods work for my
students when I use those methods with my content and in the courses I teach? The
article explores eight variables that affect active learning outcomes. Little
attention has been paid to most of them in research and practice.
Key quotations and discussion questions
1. Active learning methods used differently
“‘Active learning’ encompasses a wide range of
teaching methods, each of which can be located in a conceptual space defined by
the degree of preparation, student commitment, and risk of problems and failure
involved” (p. 291).
A table in the article (p. 291) lists 24 different active
learning methods, including asking questions, role playing, debating, service
learning, flipped classroom, concept mapping, and minute papers.
“The many active learning methods listed
in Table 1 are general labels for procedures that are actually being delivered
in different ways by different teacher/researchers” (p. 293).
- Does it matter whether we use active learning
approaches differently? Is it only an issue for researchers, or does the
variation in individual use have potential effects on outcomes?
- Do all these different active learning methods
need to be classified? If so, what might that classification system look like?
- Do the various active learning methods promote
different kinds of learning? If so, what are some examples?
2. Lecture–active
learning connections
“Many if not most experienced
teachers in higher education employ some form of interactive lecturing” (p.
294).
Bernstein offers these examples of active learning
techniques frequently incorporated in lectures: demonstrations, group
activities, participation, and quizzing.
“If the lectures in the
‘lecture-only’ condition actually include opportunities for students to answer
questions or engage in other elements of active learning, the comparative
impact of the active learning conditions is likely to be small” (p. 294).
- Do you agree that most teachers no longer do
“straight lectures”?
- If the instructor occasionally asks for
questions, and maybe a student or two ask a question, is that active learning? If
not, how much student involvement merits the active learning descriptor?
- Ongoing concern about the amount of lecturing
continues. How do we determine when there is enough active learning in lectures?
Or when there’s enough lecture in active learning activities?
- Can lectures and active learning approaches be used
together, synergistically? What would be an example?
3. The skill level of the teacher
Bernstein cites three review articles that
“suggest that the impressive
benefits of active learning reported by highly skilled active learning
advocates do not usually appear when attempted by the average instructor” (p.
295).
- What role does experience play in the design
and delivery of an active learning activity?
- Can any teacher use active learning techniques
effectively?
- If positive outcomes do not result from the use
of an active learning technique, how does a teacher decide whether the problem
is with the technique or with its delivery?
4. The relationship between an active learning approach
and the content it uses
Active learning methods are being used and studied in a
wide range of disciplines, and Bernstein writes that
“advocates suggest that active
learning can improve students’ performance in every subject” (p. 291).
Later, he points out,
“There are as [of] yet no
systematic studies on this variable, and thus no evidence to suggest that
active learning methods in general are any more or less useful in any
particular discipline” (p. 296).
- Are there features of the content you teach that
do and don’t match with specific active learning methods? What’s an example?
- Do teachers use explicit criteria to match
content with active learning approaches? Are there criteria they should be
using?
- Is it a case of active learning techniques working
in every discipline but only certain ones affecting learning outcomes in that
field? Or can any active learning approach be adapted for use in any field?
5. Active
learnings effects on learning outcomes
“The effects of active learning
have been measured on many dependent variables” (p. 296).
Bernstein lists these: course exams, performance on
professional tasks, academic skills, end of course ratings, changes in
attitudes about education, and course and program dropout rates.
“Conclusions about whether
active learning methods ‘work’ are heavily dependent on how their impact is
assessed” (p. 296).
- Are all these outcomes equally appropriate
measures of active learning? Which ones are most and least appropriate?
- Can everything that active learning
accomplishes be measured? If not, what can’t be measured? Alternatively, what
aren’t we measuring?
- Are some active learning approaches more likely
than others to achieve learning outcomes? Which ones and why?
6. The individual teacher’s experience with
active learning
“Nothing in the present review
suggests that teachers should stop using active learning methods that work for
them, especially if their satisfaction is based on empirical evaluation of
those methods with their own students” (p. 299).
- Do most teachers assess the effectiveness of
their active learning approaches as rigorously as they should?
- When teachers decide to use a particular active
learning method, does their commitment to the method compromise their ability
to objectively assess its effects?
- Is it realistic to expect busy teachers to
empirically evaluate the active learning methods they’re using? Are there easy,
straightforward ways of doing so? What’s wrong with trusting the research done
by others?
