How Students Learn Biology

How People Learn

What do you notice?
What do you wonder?
1
How (You Can Help) People Learn (Biology)

impaled by Yersinia on flickr CC-BY-NC-SA

slides and resources: tinyurl.com/HPLBiologyFa13

HOW PEOPLE LEARN
Peter Newbury, Ph.D.
Center for Teaching Development,
University of California, San Diego
pnewbury@ucsd.edu
@polarisdotca
ctd.ucsd.edu
#ctducsd

October 21, 2013

Survey
Which of these do you associate with a typical
university lecture?
A) listening
B) absorbing
C) note-taking
D) learning

3


The traditional lecture is based on the
transmissionist learning model

4


(Image by um.dentistry on flickr CC)

Let’s have a learning experience…

5


Here is an important new number
system. Please learn it.

1=

7=

2=

5=

8=

3=

6

4=

6=

9=


Test
What is this number?

7


New Number System
Here’s the structure of the “tic-tac-toe” code:

1

3

4

5

6

7

8

2

8

9


Test
What is this number?

9


Scientifically Outdated, a Known Failure

We must abandon the tabula rasa
“blank slate” and “students as
empty vessels” models of teaching
and learning.

10


Constructivist Theory of Learning
New learning is built on and from existing knowledge.

You store things in long term memory
through a set of connections that are
made with previous existing memories.

Creating memories (aka learning) involves
having neurons fire and neurons link up in
networks or patterns.
11


(Images by Rebecca-Lee on flickr CC)

12


What are the patterns of
how people learn?
How do we use them?
13


How People Learn
National Research Council (2000).
How People Learn: Brain, Mind,
Experience, and School: Expanded
Edition. J.D. Bransford, A.L Brown
& R.R. Cocking (Eds.), Washington,
DC: The National Academies
Press.
Available for free as PDF
www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=9853

14


Key Finding 1
Students come to the classroom with preconceptions about
how the world works. If their initial understanding is not
engaged, they may fail to grasp the new concepts and
information that are taught, or they may learn them for
the purposes of a test but revert to their preconceptions
outside of the classroom.
(How People Learn, p 14.)

15


Key Finding 2
To develop competence in an area, students must:
a) have a deep foundation of factual knowledge,
b) understand facts and ideas in the context of a
conceptual framework, and
c) organize knowledge in ways that facilitate
retrieval and application.

16


Key Finding 3
A “metacognitive” approach to instruction can help
students learn to take control of their own learning by
defining learning goals and monitoring their progress in
achieving them.

17


Aside: metacognition
Metacognition refers to one’s knowledge concerning one’s
own cognitive processes or anything related to them.
For example, I am engaging
in metacognition if I notice
that I am having more
trouble learning A than B.
([3], [4])

meta cognition

18


Key Finding 3
achieving them.

19


Please break into groups of 3-4...
Each set of cards has
 Key Findings 1, 2, 3
 3 Implications for Teaching
 3 Designing Classroom Environments
TASK: Sort your cards into 3 groups of 3 cards by
matching the Implication for Teaching and Classroom
Environment to each Key Finding:
Designing
Classroom
Environment

20


21

Key Finding 1
Students come to the classroom with preconceptions about
how the world works. If their initial understanding is not
engaged, they may fail to grasp the new concepts and
information that are taught, or they may learn them for
the purposes of a test but revert to their preconceptions
outside of the classroom.

22


Implications for Teaching 1
Teachers must draw out and work with the preexisting
understandings that their students bring with them.

23


New Coding System
Please memorize this code:
1=

4=

7=

1

2

3

2=

5=

8=

4

5

6

3=

6=

9=

7

8

9

unsupported, unfamiliar content

24


built on pre-existing
knowledge
(tic-tac-toe board)

Classroom Environments 1
Schools and classrooms must be learner centered.

25


Learning requires interaction [2]

26


Learning gain:
100%

0.50

0

27

% of class time
NOT lecturing


pre-test

post-test

1

3
28

2

4


Key Finding 2
To develop competence in an area, students must:
a) have a deep foundation of factual knowledge,
b) understand facts and ideas in the context of a
conceptual framework, and
c) organize knowledge in ways that facilitate
retrieval and application.

29


30

Teachers must teach some subject matter in depth,
providing many examples in which the same concept is
at work and providing a firm foundation of factual
knowledge.

To provide a knowledge-centered environment, attention
must be given to what is taught (information, subject
matter), why it is taught (understanding), and what
competence or mastery looks like.
31


Development of Mastery [3]
Behavior

conscious

unconscious

incompetent

competent

Level of Expertise
32



incompetent

competent

Level of Expertise
33


Behavior

conscious

unconscious
adikko.deviantart.com

34


Behavior

conscious

unconscious

incompetent

competent

Level of Expertise
35


Behavior

conscious

unconscious

1
incompetent

competent

Level of Expertise
36


Behavior

conscious

unconscious

2
1
incompetent

competent

Level of Expertise
37


Behavior

conscious

unconscious

2

3

1
incompetent

competent

Level of Expertise
38


conscious

Behavior

3

1

4

incompetent

unconscious

2

competent

Level of Expertise
39


Why Your Students Don’t Understand You
Expert brains differ from novice brains because novices:
 lack rich, networked connections so they cannot make
inferences
 cannot reliably retrieve information
 have preconceptions that distract and confuse
 lack automization, resulting in cognitive overload

40


Key Finding 3
achieving them.

41


The teaching of metacognitive skills should be
integrated into the curriculum in a variety of subject
areas.

Formative assessments — ongoing assessments designed
to make students’ thinking visible to both teachers and
students — are essential.
Instructors need to provide opportunities for
students to practice being metacognitive: an
internal dialogue about their own thinking
42


traditional lecture
43


student-centered instruction

peer instruction with clickers
interactive demonstrations
What do you notice?
What do you wonder?
surveys of opinions
reading quizzes
worksheets
discussions
videos

44



Clicker Question
The molecules making up the dry mass of wood that
forms during the growth of a tree largely come from
A) sunlight.
B) the air.
C) the seed.
D) the soil.

Question credit: Bill Wood
45


Typical Episode of Peer Instruction (PI)
1. Instructor poses a conceptually-challenging
multiple-choice question.
2. Students think about question on their own and vote
using clickers, colored ABCD cards, smartphones,…
3. The instructor asks students to turn to their neighbors
and “convince them you’re right.”
4. After that “peer instruction”, the students vote again
and the instructor leads a class-wide discussion
concluding with why the right answer(s) is right and
the wrong answers are wrong.
46


In effective peer instruction
 students teach each other while
they may still hold or remember
their novice preconceptions
 students discuss the concepts in their
own (novice) language

students learn
and practice
how to think,
communicate
like experts

 the instructor finds out what the students know (and
don’t know) and reacts, building on their initial
understanding and preconceptions.

47


Veritasium (Derek Muller)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KZb2_vcNTg

As you watch the
video, notice how
Derek talks to the
people he
interviews.

48


What do you notice?
What do you wonder?
surveys of opinions
reading quizzes
worksheets
discussions
videos

49



Chemistry Day 4 by pennstatenews on flickr CC-BY-NC
50

Clicker question
A ball is rolling around
the inside of a circular
track. The ball
leaves the track
at point P.

C

B
A

D

P
Which path
does the ball
follow?
51


(adapted from Mazur)

E

What do you notice?
What do you wonder?
surveys of opinions
reading quizzes
worksheets
discussions
videos

52



What do you notice?
What do you wonder?
53

impaled by Yersinia on flickr CC-BY-NC-SA

Active Learning in Discussion Sections
 peer instruction with clickers, colored ABCD cards, ABCDE
pdf on smartphones,…
 1-Minute papers: What is most confusing right now?
 Problem Solving in Groups
 Provide scaffold/structure
 Ask what steps would you take to solve problem
(versus actually solving them)
 Critique or “fix” sample work/problem
 overhead slides, document cameras, board?
 If there’s a skill expert biologists have (drawing,
identifying structures in diagram, etc.) give students a
worksheet which gives them practice doing it.
54


How People Learn
Learning is not about what the
instructor does. It’s about what
students do for themselves.

55


How People Learn

Students will not learn (just) by
listening to the instructor explain.

56


How People Learn

Students will not learn (just) by
listening to the instructor explain.
BE LESS HELPFUL
57


If in doubt, ask yourself…

Who is doing the work,
you or the students?

58


References
1.

2.

3.
4.

5.

6.
59

National Research Council (2000). How People Learn: Brain, Mind,
Experience, and School: Expanded Edition. J.D. Bransford, A.L Brown & R.R.
Cocking (Eds.),Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
Prather, E.E, Rudolph, A.L., Brissenden, G., & Schlingman, W.M. (2009). A
national study assessing the teaching and learning of introductory
astronomy. Part I. The effect of interactive instruction. Am. J. Phys. 77, 4,
320-330.
Sprague, J., & Stuart, D. (2000). The speaker’s handbook. Fort Worth, TX:
Harcourt College Publishers.
Flavell, J. H. (1976). Metacognitive aspects of problem solving. In L. B.
Resnick (Ed.), The nature of intelligence (pp.231-236). Hillsdale, NJ:
Erlbaum.
Brame, C. (2013). Thinking about metacognition. [blog] January, 2013,
Available at: http://cft.vanderbilt.edu/2013/01/thinking-aboutmetacognition/ [Accessed: 14 Jan 2013].
Mazur, E. (2009). Farewell, Lecture? Science, 323, 5910, 50-51.


How Students Learn Biology

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