1. Making learning active
Pedagogy First (For Innovative Resources Supporting Technology enhanced learning)
Making learning active

2. Session aim: To develop active learning approaches in our practice
Objectives:
Identify key activity-based pedagogical approaches
Sample activities using new technology
Design your own activities using activity-based pedagogy and new technology
It’s not about telling you what to do!

3. Thinking about teacher-led lectures
Consider your experience of lectures. In general:
How effective are lectures at transferring information?
How is learning assessed during the lecture?
Who is active and who is passive during a lecture?
What barriers to learning might students face during a lecture?
How effectively are lectures at transferring skills?
Role allocation:
On the left: take notes of your discussion
On the right: prepare to feedback these notes back to the whole group
5 questions 5 minutes
Allocate time keeper

4. What is active learning?
Listen and make notes on the following brief lecture on active learning. Consider: What is active learning? What are key principles of active learning?

5. What is active learning?
Gives the opportunity to apply prior learning and experiences (learners are not empty vessels!)
Practical based tasks can help learners connect knowledge to realistic and useful situations to see its importance and relevance (develop employability skills)
Pair and group tasks can help to build broader social/employability skills (Staffordshire Graduate Attributes)
Gives the learner regular feedback on their incomplete understandings and encourages them fix this, for example by helping each other.
Facilitation of tasks gives the teacher regular, informal feedback on which learners understand, and who needs help
Develops higher level thinking skills such as analysis problem solving, and evaluation
Gives the teacher a bit of a rest…
We learn by doing. Research shows that active learning is much better recalled, enjoyed and understood. Active methods require us to ‘make our own meaning’ , that is, develop our own conceptualisations of what we are learning. Geoff Petty
Remember Bloom’s Taxonomy…
Hattie – highest effect size of regular feedback highest (see also Black and Wiliam)

6. Active learning: key principles
Set clear time boundaries
Consider extension activities for faster groups
Allocate clear roles: responsibility fosters participation
Remember to assess learning throughout
Mix with passive learning

7. Lecture regurgitation…
Pair task (2 minutes)
Compare and agree your notes on the following questions:
What is active learning?
What are key principles of active learning?
Group task (1 minute)
Compare and agree your notes
Assessment
Any areas of disagreement in your notes?
Options: Ask the teacher/Compare with the original text/lecture notes
What other ways can we make a lecture more interactive? Allocate specific topics to focus on then reconstruct in pairs/groups
Specific topics then must come up with a question each.

8. 30 seconds to go… Time to start completing your discussion
Summarise your main conclusions

9. Ok time to finish your discussion
Politely nudge anyone still talking

10. Lecture reflections Group 1:
How engaged were you during the lecture? Why? Why not?
Group 2:
What strategies were used to mix active and passive approaches to learning?
Group 3:
What strategies do you use to make lectures more active?
3 minutes

11. Kagan Cooperative Active content delivery
Memorise your teaching approach definition (1 minute)
Peer teaching and assessment (3 minutes)
Form a pair and recite your approach and definition
Test that your partner has memorised your key information correctly. Swap roles
When you have learnt each other’s information, swap cards and find another partner
Form new pairs and repeat (3 minutes)
Form new pairs and repeat…
Model this first

12. Lesson Review and Development
In small groups with 2 facilitators:
15 mins: In turn, one person briefly describes their example lesson
The group discusses and suggests:
2 Classroom activities
2 Technologies to support or enhance (Facilitators to demonstrate as required)
15 mins: Continue to next person
5 mins: each person pairs with person from another group and describes one example suggestion
Kagan approaches
After this, give number to allocate group

13. Reflection and Evaluation
What changes are you going to make to your teaching practice?
What support will you need?
For further information and videos, go to:
Evaluate today’s session (on low tech post-its!)
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