Watkins SOR User Manual download pdf (Page 5)

Journal of College Science Teaching

tenstein et al., 2007).

In addition to addressing student

concerns about introductory science

courses, there are other reasons to

believe that PI positively impacts

student retention. During class, in-

structors receive constant feedback

about students’ ideas and progress,

which allows them to better tailor

their instruction to their students’

needs. PI also creates opportuni-

ties for students to help each other.

Research on the impact of student

discussions has shown that they

can improve student performance

even among student groups who did

not have the correct answer (Smith

et al., 2009). These benets of PI

can promote greater student learn-

ing of physics concepts; indeed,

data from conceptual surveys have

consistently shown higher posttest

scores and gains on courses taught

using interactive engagement tech-

niques (Hake, 1998). Furthermore,

students have greater opportunities

to develop and practice critical skills

in scientic argumentation, such as

asking questions, articulating their

ideas, and justifying their claims to

their peers (Driver, Newton, & Os-

borne, 2000). Students also receive

continued feedback on their own

performance, allowing them to better

assess and monitor their own under-

standing. With more opportunities

to improve their conceptual under-

standing, scientic communication

practices, and metacognitive skills,

students who take a PI course may be

better prepared for intermediate and

advanced science courses, thereby

increasing the likelihood that they

will persist in a STEM major. Fi-

nally, pedagogies that engage stu-

dents in disciplinary practices have

been shown to increase self-efcacy,

which in turn increases students’

pursuit of a career in this eld (Lucas

& Barge, 2010; Mau, 2003).

Given the small number of cours-

es and unique student population

used in our study, further research is

needed to examine whether PI and

other interactive-engagement tech-

niques result in similar increases in

student retention in STEM majors at

more diverse institutions and in more

recent years. In particular, our results

point to the need to study the impact

of PI in courses that serve more un-

derclassmen; in our study the effects

of pedagogy were particularly no-

table with these students as they were

more likely to switch out of a STEM

major early in their college career.

In addition, research has shown that

there is variation in how instructors

implement PI, which can result in

different student perceptions of the

classroom (James & Willoughby,

2011; Turpen & Finkelstein, 2009,

2010) and change the nature of the

relationship between pedagogy and

student retention. Although this pa-

per examines the impact of PI, there

are other pedagogies that incorporate

the beneficial features described

here, such as eliciting and responding

to students’ ideas and encouraging

student discussions (e.g., Brewe,

2008; Etkina & Van Heuvelen, 2007;

McDermott, Schaffer, & University

of Washington Physics Education

Group, 2002; Redish, 2003) and are

therefore likely to obtain similar re-

sults. As more instructors turn to new

pedagogies in a wide range of higher

education classroom settings (Sevian

& Robinson, 2011), these promising

results invite further examinations on

the longitudinal effects of individual

course reforms.

Acknowledgments

The authors thank the Mazur Group,

John Willett, Jason Dowd, and Brian

Danielak for useful discussions about

this work. J. Watkins carried out the

analysis and wrote the rst draft of the

paper. E. Mazur collected the in-class

data and contributed to the development

of the paper. The research described was

supported in part by a National Science

Foundation Grant (NSF DUE-0716902).

References

Bigelow, J., Butchart S., & Handeld,

T. (2006). Evaluations of peer

instruction. Retrieved from http://

arts.monash.edu.au/philosophy/

peer-instruction/evaluations/index.

php

Brewe, E. (2008). Modeling theory

applied: Modeling instruction in

introductory physics. American

Journal of Physics, 76, 1155–1160.

Brewe, E., Kramer, L., & Sawtelle,

V. (2012). Investigating student

communities with network analysis

of interactions in a physics learning

center. Physical Review Special

Topics—PER, 8(010101).

Crouch, C. H., & Mazur, E. (2001).

Peer Instruction: Ten years of

experience and results. American

Journal of Physics, 69, 970–977.

Crouch, C. H., Watkins, J., Fagen,

A. P., & Mazur, E. (2007). Peer

Instruction: Engaging students one-

on-one, all at once. In E. F. Redish

& P. J. Cooney (Eds.), Research-

based reform of university physics

(pp. 1–55). College Park, MD:

American Association of Physics

Teachers.

Driver, R., Newton, P., & Osborne,

J. (2000). Establishing the norms

of scientic argumentation in

classrooms. Science Education, 84,

287–312.

Etkina, E., & Van Heuvelen, A. (2007).

Investigative science learning

environment—a science process

approach to learning physics. In E.

F. Redish & P. J. Cooney (Eds.),

Research-based reform of university

physics (pp. 1–48). College Park,

MD: American Association of

Physics Teachers.

Fortenberry, N. L., Sullivan, J. F.,

Jordan, P. N., & Knight, D. W.

(2007). Engineering education

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317(5842), 1175–1176.

Hake, R. R. (1998). Interactive-

engagement versus traditional

methods: A six-thousand-student

survey of mechanics test data

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