Source: http://cwsei.ubc.ca/resources/papers.htm
Timestamp: 2019-04-23 06:42:23+00:00

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Go to the SEI Research tab to see papers resulting from CWSEI and CU-SEI research.
in The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance, Ch. 38, (Cambridge University Press, 2006).
This book chapter is a nice review of the studies on the role of deliberate practice on the development of expertise. The basic conclusion is that many characteristics once believed to reflect innate talent are actually the result of deliberate practice: intense, long-term practice aimed at continued improvement of performance.
Cognition and Instruction, 16(4), pp. 475-522 (1998).
This paper describes 3 studies demonstrating that analyzing contrasting cases can help learners generate the differentiated knowledge structures that enable them to understand a text or lecture deeply. Noticing the distinctions between contrasting cases creates a "time for telling"; learners are prepared to be told the significance of the distinctions they have discovered.
Cognition and Instruction, 22(2), 129–184 (2004).
This paper describes studies that demonstrate the value of invention activities for preparing students to learn from other resources (such as a lecture or written resource). CU-SEI, CWSEI, and Dan Schwartz produced a short "Teaching Expert Thinking" instructor's guidance on designing and using invention activities.
In Metacognition: Knowing about knowing (pp.185-205), J. Metcalfe and A. Shimamura (Eds.), Cambridge, MA: MIT Press (1994).
This writing examines the contributors to non-optimal training, such as the trainer's & learner's misreading of progress toward long-term retention and differences between the conditions of training and conditions in the real-world environment.
Learning and Teaching in Higher Education, Issue 1, (2004-5).
This article is about how to design assessment that supports worthwhile learning. CWSEI produced a 2-pager instructor's guidance based on this paper.
Improving academic achievement: Impact of Psychological Factors on Education, Ch. 7, edited by J. Aronson, Academic Press, pp. 135-158, (2002).
A summary of studies on what factors make individual tutoring such a successful educational method. Many of the practices identified can be implemented in the classroom.
Science, 323(5910), pp. 122-124 (2009).
When students answer an in-class conceptual question individually using clickers, discuss it with their neighbors, and then revote on the same question, the % of correct answers typically increases. To test whether this was truly due to increased understanding, the researchers followed the exercise with an isomorphic question that students answered individually. Results indicate that peer discussion enhances understanding, even when none of the students in a discussion group originally knows the correct answer.
Science, 332(6031), pp. 862-864 (2011).
The authors measured the learning of a specific set of topics and objectives when taught by 3 hours of traditional lecture given by an experienced highly rated instructor and 3 hours of instruction given by a trained but inexperienced instructor using instruction based on research in cognitive psychology and physics education. They found increased student attendance, higher engagement, and more than twice the learning in the section taught using research-based instruction.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 111(23), pp. 8410–8415 (2014).
A metaanalysis of 225 studies that reported data on examination scores or failure rates when comparing student performance in undergraduate science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) courses under traditional lecturing versus active learning. The effect sizes indicate that on average, student performance on examinations and concept inventories increased by 0.47 SDs under active learning (n = 158 studies), and that the odds ratio for failing was 1.95 under traditional lecturing (n = 67 studies).
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 112(36), pp. 11199–11204 (2015).
Understanding and thinking critically about scientific evidence is a crucial skill in the modern world. The authors present a simple learning framework that employs cycles of decisions about making and acting on quantitative comparisons between datasets or data and models. This structure led to significant and sustained improvement in students’ critical thinking behaviors.
The National Academies Board on Science Education commissioned paper for the Evidence on Promising Practices in Undergraduate Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) Education project (2008).
This white paper offers a set of promising educational practices and evaluates them against two sets of standards: (1) ease of implementation and (2) evidence for positive influences on student learning and persistence. The practice that ranks the highest against the combination of both standards is Designing In-class Activities to Actively Engage Students.
Research-Based Reform of University Physics, 1 (1) (2007).
CBE—Life Sciences Education, 14(1), pp. 1-11 (2015).
This article reviews and summarizes the various bodies of research and provides instructors and researchers with a research-based model for the effective implementation of Peer Instruction. Limitations of current studies and recommendations for future empirical inquiries are also provided.
CBE—Life Sciences Education, 6(1), pp. 29-41 (2007).
A study demonstrating that students have favorable opinions about the use of student response systems, and increased use of these systems increases student learning.
American Journal of Physics, V. 74, N. 1, pp. 31-39 (2006).
This paper has an excellent discussion of different types of clicker questions and the cognitive processes they can tie into.
Journal of Interactive Learning Research (JILR) Vol 19(3), pp. 397-419 (2008), and Vol 19(4), pp. 551-577 (2008).
A thorough study of design and testing of interactive simulations, describing the PhET design process, what features are effective for engaging students in educationally productive interactions, and the underlying principles which support empirically developed guidelines. In part II, they describe in detail the design features used to create an intuitive simulation for students to use.
Physical Review Special Topics - Physics Education Research V. 3, 010104 (2007).
A comparative study of student understanding for students who attended recitation classes that used different teaching methods.
American Journal of Physics, V. 72, N. 6, pp. 835-838 (2004).
This study compared student learning from different modes of presenting classroom demonstrations. They find that students who passively observe demonstrations understand the underlying concepts no better than students who do not see the demonstration at all. Students who predict the demonstration outcome before seeing it, however, display significantly greater understanding.
Journal of Research in Science Teaching, V. 34, N. 5, pp. 509–533 (1997).
This study uses observational data, videotapes of classroom transactions, interviews with students and the teacher, and students’ notebooks to find out why students fail to learn from classroom demonstrations.
American Journal of Physics, Vol 60, Issue 7, pp. 627-636 (1992).
This study involving college students in a large introductory physics course finds that better problem solutions emerged through collaboration than were achieved by individuals working alone. Also, the instructional approach improved the problem solving performance of students at all ability levels.
American Journal of Physics, Vol 60, Issue 7, pp. 637-644 (1992).
A companion to the previous paper, focusing on factors that affect the functioning of groups. They find that groups were more likely to use an effective problem-solving strategy when given context-rich problems than when given standard textbook problems. Well-functioning groups were found to result from specific structural and management procedures governing group members' interactions.
Ch. 4 of Team-based Learning: A Transformative Use of Small Groups, edited by L. Michaelsen, A. Knight, and L. Dee Fink, Stylus Publishing, Sterling VA. (2002).
A good reference on group dynamics.
Scientific American, V. 295, Issue 2, pp. 64-71 (August 2006).
This article discusses research aimed at discovering how individuals become experts within their respective fields through the examination of chess masters and their mental processes. "The preponderance of psychological evidence indicates that experts are made, not born."
This book chapter is a nice review of the studies on the role of deliberate practice on the development of expertise. The basic conclusion is that many characteristics once believed to reflect innate talent are actually the result of deliberate practice: intense, long-term practice aimed at continued improvement of performance. CWSEI staff and Science Teaching & Learning Fellows voted this reading as one of the "greatest hits."
Psychological Review, Vol. 100. No. 3, 363-406 (1993).
If you want more detail on studies of expertise development and deliberate practice, this paper is a good resource.
Review of Research in Education, Vol. 24., pp. 61-100 (1999).
Transfer, the ability of a person to apply knowledge, skills, etc. learned in one context to a novel context, is a major goal of education. The authors review the research on Transfer and propose that Transfer be viewed from the perspective of preparation for future learning.
This paper describes studies that demonstrate the value of invention activities for preparing students to learn from other resources (such as a lecture or written resource). CWSEI staff and Science Teaching & Learning Fellows voted this paper as one of the "greatest hits" and CU-SEI, CWSEI, and Dan Schwartz produced a short "Teaching Expert Thinking" instructor's guidance on designing and using invention activities.
Science, Vol. 319. no. 5865, pp. 966-968 (2008).
This paper reports the finding that repeated studying after learning had no effect on delayed recall, but repeated testing produced a large positive effect. In addition, students' predictions of their performance were uncorrelated with actual performance. The results demonstrate the critical role of retrieval practice in consolidating learning and show that even university students seem unaware of this fact.
Psychological Science, Vol 17 Issue 3, pp. 249-255 (2006).
The authors studied the testing effect with educationally relevant materials and investigated whether testing facilitates learning only because tests offer an opportunity to restudy material. They found that on delayed tests, prior testing produced substantially greater retention than studying. CWSEI staff and Science Teaching & Learning Fellows voted this paper as one of the "greatest hits."
This writing examines the contributors to non-optimal training, such as the trainer's & learner's misreading of progress toward long-term retention and differences between the conditions of training and conditions in the real-world environment. CWSEI staff and Science Teaching & Learning Fellows voted this paper as one of the "greatest hits."
Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied. Vol 14(4), pp. 329-339 (2008).
Two studies are described that find as the interestingness of extraneous details was increased, student understanding decreased (as measured by transfer). Results are consistent with a cognitive theory of multimedia learning, in which highly interesting details sap processing capacity away from deeper cognitive processing of the core material during learning.
This article is about how to design assessment that supports worthwhile learning. CWSEI staff and Science Teaching & Learning Fellows voted this paper as one of the "greatest hits" and CWSEI produced a 2-pager instructor's guidance based on this paper.
American Journal of Physics, Volume 66, Issue 1, pp. 64-74 (1998).
This paper is frequently cited as an excellent example of the importance of having a widely accepted assessment to compare the effectiveness of different forms of instruction and drive change in instruction. It is an analysis of Force Concept Inventory (FCI) data for 62 introductory physics courses enrolling a total of over 6000 students -- including diverse student populations in high schools, colleges, and universities.
American Journal of Physics, Volume 77, Issue 4, pp. 320-330 (2009).
Following the theme of Hake's study, above, but with an astronomy concept inventory: the Light and Spectroscopy Concept Inventory (LSCI).
Physical Review Special Topics - Physics Education Research, V. 2, 010105 (2006).
A good example of what is involved in developing a concept inventory (test of conceptual understanding).
CBE Life Sciences Education, Vol. 7(4), pp. 422-430 (2008).
Another good example of a carefully validated concept inventory.
Physical Review Special Topics - Physics Education Research V. 2, 020102 (2006).
This paper compares multiple choice exams created collectively by a group of involved faculty members with results of corresponding open ended exams. The study shows that the different forms of the exam provide the essentially the same result.
American Journal of Physics, V. 72, N. 2, pp. 164-169 (2004).
This describes a study testing how 30 instructors independently graded the same open ended exam solutions. The study shows two things, 1) how variable the marking is for open ended exam questions, and 2) how an instructors’ marking can be inconsistent with what they say they value in student learning.
Journal of Educational Measurement, V. 31, N. 3, pp. 234-250 (1994).
Very extensive and detailed analysis of advanced placement exams, with particular emphasis on chemistry, looking at comparison of multiple choice and open ended sections. They show that multiple choice questions are clearly superior for assessing student mastery, at a tiny fraction of the cost.
Physical Review Special Topics - Physics Education Research V. 2, 010101 (2006).
This paper describes the development and validation of the Colorado Learning Attitudes about Science Survey (CLASS) instrument designed to measure student beliefs about physics and about learning physics.
American Journal of Physics, Volume 77, Issue 7, pp. 629-642 (2009).
If you can get past the title, reading this paper will give you a good sense of what approaches (or, rather, combination of approaches) produce both strong gains on pre-post conceptual tests and strong pre-post gains on attitude/perception (epistemological) surveys. The latter is unprecedented in large introductory physics courses.
Physical Review Special Topics - Physics Education Research 11, 020108 (2015).
This work was guided by the principle of deliberate practice for the development of expertise, and this principle was used in the design of the materials and the orchestration of the classroom activities of the students. The authors present their process for efficiently converting a traditional lecture course based on instructor notes into activities for such a course with active learning methods. Ninety percent of the same material was covered and scores on common exam problems showed a 15% improvement with an effect size greater than 1 after the transformation.
CBE—Life Sciences Education 9(4), pp. 504-512 (2010).
During invention activities in a first-year biology class, students were presented with problems that were parallel to those that living cells must solve. This study compared students who participated in the invention activities sessions with students who participated in sessions of structured problem solving and with students who did not participate in either activity. When faced with developing a solution to a challenging and unfamiliar biology problem, invention activity students were much quicker to engage with the problem and routinely provided multiple reasonable hypotheses. In contrast the other students were significantly slower in beginning to work on the problem and routinely produced relatively few ideas.
Physical Review Special Topics - Physics Education Research 5, 020110 (2009).
This paper shows that 1) conceptual learning is retained, 2) a better conceptual foundation is established in introductory courses by proven pedagogical methods and activities, and 3) students with a better foundation in intro courses do somewhat better on high level quantitative problem solving.
International Statistical Review, 75 (3), pp. 372-396 (2007).
Provides an overview of current thinking on statistical education research.
Journal of Geoscience Education, V. 52, N. 1, pp. 81-86 (2004).
This is about teaching mineralogy using the layers of the Earth as a framework (starting at the core where things are “simple,” moving outwards, etc.). This is different approach; its usually taught by mineral families which does not give an intuitive framework for beginners.
Educational Researcher, Vol. 13, No. 6., pp. 4-16 (1984).
Under the best learning conditions we can devise (individual tutoring), the average student is 2 sigma (standard deviations) above the average control student taught under conventional methods of instruction. This paper describes results of studies aimed at finding instructional methods that achieve such dramatic results for classrooms with many students.
A summary of studies on what factors make individual tutoring such a successful educational method. Many of the practices identified can be implemented in the classroom. CWSEI staff and Science Teaching & Learning Fellows voted this paper as one of the "greatest hits."
Journal of College Science Teaching, v. 39 no. 2, pp. 52-57 (2009).
The (CWSEI) authors examine student and faculty opinions regarding the use of detailed learning goals in three courses.
Scientific American; Vol. 300 Issue 3, pp. 46-54 (March 2009).
The article discusses how new brain cells are created in adults and the ways that these cells can be strengthened and kept alive. Use it or lose it!
American Psychological Society, 14 (3), (March 2001).
American Journal of Physics, V. 67, Issue S1, pp. S52-S57 (1999).
This paper describes the results of a survey indicating that students perceive "trying to understand physics well" to be a significantly different activity from "trying to do well in the course."
Psychological Science in the Public Interest, Vol 9 Issue 3, pp. 105-119 (2009).
The authors, prominent Cognitive Psychologists, evaluate the evidence for instructional relevance of preferred "learning styles" and conclude that there is no adequate evidence base to justify incorporating learning-styles assessments into general educational practice. Quoting the paper: "The contrast between the enormous popularity of the learning-styles approach within education and the lack of credible evidence for its utility is, in our opinion, striking and disturbing."
Management Learning, 28, 2, pp. 115-133 (1997).
A critique of learning style theory from a critical education perspective.

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