Some subscribers to Phys-L might be interested in
a discussion-list post "The Science/Math
Education Shift from Teaching to Learning" [Hake
(2011)].
The abstract reads:
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ABSTRACT: This post is a slight expansion and
improvement of an earlier post "Anatomy
Education." The revision was stimulated by the
interesting 11-post POD thread "Re: Open inquiry
is bad? (in some intro tech courses)" at
<http://bit.ly/miR63T>, especially Anton Tolman's
(2011) emphasis on John Tagg's (2003) important
book "The Learning Paradigm College."
Robin Hopkins in a POD post "SHIFT IN THE
TEACHING OF SCIENCE" wrote: "I'm interested in
the shift that is required of traditional
anatomists as the medical school moves toward a
curriculum that requires anatomy to be
taught/learned in ways that are more aligned with
the clinical application of anatomy than simply
'knowing' anatomy (usually for tests)."
If the tests are of the usual classroom type then
they require only the regurgitation of memorized
material rather than higher-order learning such
as the understanding of scientific concepts. I
suspect that that higher-order learning is
required for the *effective* clinical application
of anatomy just as it is for the successful
pursuit of science/math professions generally.
In my opinion, THE MAJOR SHIFT IN SCIENCE/MATH
EDUCATION IS THE SHIFT "FROM TEACHING TO
LEARNING: A NEW PARADIGM FOR UNDERGRADUATE
EDUCATION" [Barr & Tagg (1995), Tagg (2003)].
But unknown to most of academia, education
researchers have developed "Concept Inventories"
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concept_inventory>
that can be used in *formative* pre/post testing
to gauge the impact of courses on students'
learning and understanding of scientific
concepts. At least in physics such testing
demonstrates that "Interactive Engagement" (IE)
courses result in course-averaged normalized
learning gains <g> that are about two-standard
deviations above those of "Traditional" (T)
passive-student lecture courses [Hake (1998a,b;
2008)].
I give 31 hot-linked references to some of the relevant literature.
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"I point to the following unwelcome truth: much
as we might dislike the implications, research is
showing that didactic exposition of abstract
ideas and lines of reasoning (however engaging
and lucid we might try to make them) to passive
listeners yields pathetically thin results in
learning and understanding - except in the very
small percentage of students who are specially
gifted in the field."
Arnold Arons in "Teaching Introductory Physics" (p. vii, 1997)
REFERENCES [URL's shortened by <http://bit.ly/> and accessed on 22 June 2011.]
Arons, A.B. 1997. "Teaching Introductory
Physics." Wiley. Amazon.com information at
<http://amzn.to/bBPfop>. Note the searchable
"Look Inside" feature.
Hake, R.R. 2011. "The Science/Math Education
Shift from Teaching to Learning" online on the
OPEN! AERA-L archives at <http://bit.ly/ijJeCm>.
Post of 22 Jun 2011 08:13:15-0700 to AERA-L and
NetGold. The abstract and link to the complete 24
kB post are being transmitted to various
discussion lists and are also on my blog
"Hake'sEdStuff" at <http://bit.ly/jNAI7r> with a
provision for comments.