Use of Classroom Voting in Liberal Arts College Classes (Small and Large)

Use of Classroom Voting in Liberal Arts College Classes (Small and Large) Ron Buckmire Occidental CollegeLos Angeles, CAron@oxy.edu

Outline • Goals of this talk • Large Classes • 44 students, Difference Equations, Summer 2009 • 38 (and 31) students, Calculus 1 (Sec 1&2), Fall 2007 • Small Classes • 15 students, Differential Equations, Fall 2009 • 22 students, Linear Algebra, Spring 2008 • Examples • Conclusions • Future Plans • Sources and Resources "MAA Session on Engaging Students with Classroom Voting" (Joint Meetings, 01/14/2010)

Goals of this talk • To communicate my experiences with use of clickers in small and large classrooms at a (now-famous) liberal arts college • To provide preliminary results on an experiment on student learning in Differential Equations • To get ideas for other ways to measure effectiveness of clickers on learning outcomes in the future "MAA Session on Engaging Students with Classroom Voting" (Joint Meetings, 01/14/2010)

“Large” Classes • By “Large” I mean Classes Larger Than 24 • Calculus 1, Fall 2007 (38 and 31 students) • First Time Ever Using Clickers • Used Clickers About Once Per Week (12 times) • Formative and Summative Assessment • Difference Equations, Summer 2009 (44 students) • Daily class meetings (4x week for 4 weeks) • Used classroom voting Every Single Day • All Entering First-Year Students "MAA Session on Engaging Students with Classroom Voting" (Joint Meetings, 01/14/2010)

Small Classes • Linear Algebra, Spring 2008 • 22 students • Used classroom voting on 24 of 36 class days • Made mistake of making no content changes • Limited classroom and student discussion • Final Exam included a Multiple Choice section drawn from Clicker questions • Unsuccessful implementation "MAA Session on Engaging Students with Classroom Voting" (Joint Meetings, 01/14/2010)

Small Classes • Differential Equations, Fall 2009 • 15 students • Used clickers about once a week (16 times) • Used exactly the same class materials from Differential Equations, Fall 2008 (12 students) • Extended student and classroom discussions • Gave exact same final exam to Fall 2008 and Fall 2009 classes, average score went down (76.6 to 71.5) "MAA Session on Engaging Students with Classroom Voting" (Joint Meetings, 01/14/2010)

Final Exam Scores Differential Equations Fall 2008 versus 2009 "MAA Session on Engaging Students with Classroom Voting" (Joint Meetings, 01/14/2010)

Example 1: Calculus 1 (Fall 2007) Class 11: Question 1 At some point in time, you were exactly three feet tall. A. True B. False "MAA Session on Engaging Students with Classroom Voting" (Joint Meetings, 01/14/2010)

Example 2: Calculus 1 (Fall 2007) Quiz 1 Was… • Too Easy • Easy • Hard • Too Hard "MAA Session on Engaging Students with Classroom Voting" (Joint Meetings, 01/14/2010)

Example 3: Calculus 1 (Fall 2007) Student Responses To Exam 2 Self-Assessment "MAA Session on Engaging Students with Classroom Voting" (Joint Meetings, 01/14/2010)

Example 4: Linear Algebra (Spring 2008) Class 25: Question 5 1. TRUE.2. FALSE. There are multiple bases for R2 so there must be multiple orthogonal bases for R2. All you need to do is pick two vectors that are not scalar multiples of each other, are orthogonal and then normalize them to produce multiple orthonormal bases in R2. Here are some more "MAA Session on Engaging Students with Classroom Voting" (Joint Meetings, 01/14/2010)

Example 5: Difference Equations (Summer 2009) Question 2: Given the sequence {1, 3, 6, 10, 15, 21, …} which of the following is TRUE? A) Δ2an = 0 B) Δ2an = 2 C) Δ2an= 1 D) None of the above "MAA Session on Engaging Students with Classroom Voting" (Joint Meetings, 01/14/2010)

Example 6: Differential Equations (Fall 2009) Euler’s Method for Systems of First Order ODEs • I completely understand this topic and I am confident about answering exam questions on it. • I understand this topic mostly BUT I am not very confident about answering exam questions on it. • I barely understand this topic and could only answer a basic question on it. • I don’t understand this topic at all and could not answer any question on it. "MAA Session on Engaging Students with Classroom Voting" (Joint Meetings, 01/14/2010)

Example 7: Differential Equations (Fall 2009) "MAA Session on Engaging Students with Classroom Voting" (Joint Meetings, 01/14/2010)

Example 8: Differential Equations (Fall 2009) October 28, 2009 Question 9 "MAA Session on Engaging Students with Classroom Voting" (Joint Meetings, 01/14/2010)

Conclusions • Classroom voting can be used in both large and small classes and actually seems to be a bit easier to implement effectively in large classes • Classroom voting can also be a useful technique to provide feedback on the class itself • Hard to measure impact on learning outcomes "MAA Session on Engaging Students with Classroom Voting" (Joint Meetings, 01/14/2010)

Future Work • Using clickers again in Differential Equations Fall 2010 • Hoping to teach the class in such a way that the impact of using clickers on learning outcomes can be measured • Possibly apply clickers to First-Year Cultural Studies course (Gender, Race and Gay Rights in the Obama Era) "MAA Session on Engaging Students with Classroom Voting" (Joint Meetings, 01/14/2010)

Sources and Resources • Project MathQUEST (Math Questions to Engage Students) http://mathquest.carroll.edu/ • Derrick Bruff’s Teaching With Classroom Response Systemshttp://derekbruff.com/teachingwithcrs/ • Cornell’s GoodQuestions Project http://www.math.cornell.edu/~GoodQuestions/index.html • Ron Buckmire’sCourses I Teach websitehttp://faculty.oxy.edu/ron/math/ "MAA Session on Engaging Students with Classroom Voting" (Joint Meetings, 01/14/2010)

Use of Classroom Voting in Liberal Arts College Classes (Small and Large)