A National Study Assessing the Teaching and Learning of Introductory Astronomy; Part I: The Effect of Interactive Instruction

Details A National Study Assessing the Teaching and Learning of Introductory Astronomy; Part I: The Effect of Interactive Instruction A National Study Assessing the Teaching and Learning of Introductory Astronomy; Part I: The Effect of Interactive Instruction

Jan 2009

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2009aas...21342902r&link_type=abstract

American Astronomical Society, AAS Meeting #213, #429.02; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 41, p.260

Computer Science

Learning

Scientific paper

We present the results of a national study on the teaching and learning of astronomy taught in general education, non-science major, introductory astronomy courses (Astro 101). Nearly 4000 students enrolled in 69 sections of Astro 101 taught at 30 institutions around the United States completed (pre- and post-instruction) the Light and Spectroscopy Concept Inventory (LSCI) from Fall 2006 to Fall 2007. The classes varied in size from very small (N<10) to large (N 180) and were from all types of institutions, including both 2-year and 4-year colleges and universities. To study how the instruction in different classrooms affected student learning, we developed and administered an Interactivity Assessment Instrument (IAI). This short survey, completed by instructors, allowed us to estimate the fraction of total classroom time that was dedicated to the use of interactive learning strategies.
Pre-instruction LSCI scores were clustered around 25% (24±2%), independent of class size and institution type; however, the normalized gains for these classes varied from about (-)0.07-0.50. These two results suggest that the differences in gain were due to instruction in the classroom, not the size of class or type of institution. Interactivity Assessment Scores (IAS's) ranged from 0%-50%, showing that our IAI was able to distinguish between classes with higher and lower levels of interactive instruction. A comparison of class-averaged gain score to IAS showed that higher interactivity classes (IAS > 25%) were the only instructional environments capable of reaching the highest gains ( > 0.30). However, the range of gains seen for the higher interactivity classes was quite wide, suggesting that the use of interactive learning strategies is not sufficient by itself to achieve high student gains.
We acknowledge the NSF for funding under Award No. 0715517, a CCLI Phase III Grant for the Collaboration of Astronomy Teaching Scholars (CATS) Program.

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