Using Technology to Increase Active Participation in the Learning Process

“To produce graduates who are scientifically literate or capable scientists requires that we help all students develop a conceptual understanding of scientific topics, competent science process skills and higher order cognitive skills rather than just superficial familiarity with a broad range of topics and vocabulary that will be lost quickly because it has been acquired through rote memorization." Dr. Don French Professor Department of Zoology Oklahoma State University Click here to see the interview. Click here to see the presentation. (Requires Real Player)

To truly engage students, we must make them active participants in their education by incorporating what is known about how people learn through constructivist theory. This involves engaging students in real-world problem solving, introducing concepts within meaningful contexts, forcing students to confront and adjust their misconceptions, guiding students while they construct their own understanding of concepts, and making students aware of their understanding through formative and self-assessment. Students must learn how to apply their knowledge and scientific reasoning skills. We can accomplish this not by what we do in the classroom, but by what we have the students do.”

To begin the process of producing such graduates, Donald French, who is a professor in the Zoology Department, worked with a group of faculty from the three life-sciences departments to revise the introductory biology course, which is taught to over 1900 students per year. In the theory portion of this course, faculty use multimedia software to present scenarios to students who work collaboratively to develop hypotheses to answer questions, explain observations, and solve problems. Of central importance is having students learn to build connections that integrate concepts and processes that emerge at various levels of biological organization. In the laboratory, the students also work collaboratively to develop and test hypotheses that explain the observations or answer the challenges presented in the introductory material presented in each investigation. Here the emphasis is on students developing competency in conducting scientific investigations and communication.

This Tech Tuesday, Dr. French presented one of the scenarios to showcase the multimedia software and its use in engaging students from all majors. He also discussed the design of the software and demonstrate some of the active learning and formative assessment techniques he uses in lecture, including minute papers and electronic personal response systems. He presented a brief overview of the use of computer-based data acquisition systems in the laboratory. He also conducted a tour of the website that supports the course through hyperlinked study guides, interactive exams, lecture videos, multimedia tutorials and pre-lab exercises, concept maps, animations, and database-driven applications. He also demonstrated the Concept Competency Inventory system that helps make students aware of their strengths and weaknesses by analyzing the data from their exams.

Dr. French is the President-elect of the Society for College Science Teachers and member of the Council of the National Science Teachers Association, a past Chair of the Four Year College Section of the National Association of Biology Teachers, a founding member of the MERLOT biology editorial board, and chair of the advisory board for the Journal of College Science Teaching. He has been awarded the Outstanding Undergraduate Science Teacher Award from the Society for College Science Teachers, Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Education Instructional Technology Excellence Award, and Phi Eta Sigma Honor Society Award for Excellence in Freshman Instruction. He has received numerous grants from NSF, HHMI (through CTBS, RSBS, and OPBS) and others for course and laboratory improvement, published numerous articles in journals and books about instructional techniques, and delivered over 100 presentations and workshops.

For more information on Tech Tuesday, including time, locations, links to recent presentations, or to access last semester's archives, click on any Tech Tuesday link or go to http://fp.okstate.edu/techtuesday.

This page was last updated on Sunday, April 3, 2005 1:19 PM .

For more details or information email Steve Brown.