David and all:
I am most pleased that you said "the word"... in that I had never before
experienced such (over?)reaction on the part of students, albeit a minority
(but, sufficient numbers and direct enough to attract one's attention)
from introducing a particular method into my teaching (and I have been
teaching a very long time). Due to the several very helpful postings
about the matter, I now realize that this kind of reaction is perhaps quite
common and wide-spread... maybe TBL needs a Warning Label??... and, I am
seeing ways from the various postings to diffuse and better address the
problem in my next offering of the class. Thank you for that.
Due to my research focus being in behavioral/psychological economics, I
think the point you make in this most recent post is also awfully
important, assuming I am interpreting it correctly:
"Some students are remarkably amenable to the whole approach using TBL....
I would like to think that making a TBL team work well is just a technical
matter, but I know better."
which to me means there are certain individuals, no matter how well one
structures the teams, explains the procedure, etc., who will always resist
the TBL approach. There is probably nothing that can be done (nor probably
should be done; individuals do need the right to choose) about this, other
than to be aware of it, and more consciously manage it.
On the latter, we actually did try, in the sense that we indicated early-on
that we realized there were different learning styles and preferences (we
offer them the opportunity to take the Myers-Briggs assessment the first
week of class, and then do a class session on what it means for learning
and teaching styles), so there would be variety in the way we approached
the class (which is a 3-period class, all done in one evening, which also
creates other challenges, in keeping attention to task). We indeed did
provide variety, especially at the outset as we introduced main principles
and ideas/ theories... albeit the TBL (RATs, IF AT forms, etc) approach
gained a kind of momentum of its own, in that so many really liked it
(including us, the TAs and me) that we did less lecturing as we went
along... in retrospect, this was probably a mistake. It is now clear (we
did not know it during the actual class offering), that those who
absolutely dug-in on their resistance to TBL became quite irritated by the
end of the semester, which blind-sided us... we were only hearing and
seeing the positive feedback, and the Teams seemed to be doing just
fine...smiling faces, laughing, etc., during team events during class, and
better quality team produced products than from years past. Also exam
grades were higher than in years past: More learning at work. We thought
we really had a winner... until the end-class anonymous evaluations came
in!
Next time, we will do an anonymous survey/evaluation in mid-stream... not
only at the end of semester, when the hostility (does it help to use a
smaller font!!??) got expressed by a few. Also, this may help the end of
course evaluation: The overall "numbers evaluation" for the class (I am
copying this note to my Department Head, hoping he will support higher
student learning outcomes rather than higher numbers), dropped from the
previous 7-offerings of it, even though in those offerings we always had
used 6-7 person teams, and some team based efforts/learning, organized and
balanced using Myers-Briggs personalities assessment data, majors,
background training in the field, etc., to balance said teams. The big
difference this time was the greatly reduced time spent in "sage on the
stage/lecturing" efforts, the RATs, and the IF AT forms, and the improved
problem sets/case studies (We applaud Prof. Michaelson for his insights
here, on how to actually get a team focus on a case, rather than teams
splitting up the tasks). So, we need to attribute at least the bulk of
the reaction if not all of it, and the lower overall class evaluation, to
the parts of the TBL we introduced.
Did the students also learn more? Yes, we believe they did: Even those who
reacted extremely negatively likely learned more, albeit one proclaimed
"Didn't learn a thing about economics using this bollshit (sic) method,
actually it was horrible. I would rather listened to you talk and interact
accordingly." Will we continue to work with the TBL model? Yes,
definitely, we are encouraged by comments like: "Really liked the team
based learning. It helped me learn more than I would have on my own."
"Liked it; encouraged learning"... and, as noted above, the team products
and exams were of of higher quality), although next time around we will
better manage the downside.
I am wondering, too, if perhaps the reactions might be even stronger in
economics classes... especially for economics majors... in that
traditional economics (not mine!) classes are all about the "self-interest
of the individual" (as the title of Stephen Marglin's new book proclaims,
"...Thinking Like an Economist Undermines Community" ... we might say,
also, undermines community learning. I don't know if the negative
reaction was from the economics majors (this class is quite
interdisciplinary, in that it is at the 200 level, but we always have a
handful of econ majors), but they could have been... and, it could be
because my approach to economics is evermore about putting community back
into economy (perhaps moreso this semester than in past years offerings)...
seeing economy (the individual self-interest) embedded within the community
(the shared other-interest), with each interest tempering and conditioning
the other... which is another reason the TBL approach appeals to me... and
may not appeal to econ majors. (On a side note: The sum is greater than
the sum of the parts... i.e. community is important to economy, and to
learning: The team RAT scores were always higher than the average of the
individual RATs, and, like Professor Michaelson shows in his work,
generally also higher than the highest individual RAT score... albeit I
have only 1-year of data).
Again, thank you David, and all, for the insights and help in this matter.
Gary D. Lynne, Professor
Department of Agricultural Economics and
School of Natural Resources
103B Filley
University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Lincoln, NE 68583-0922
Website: http://agecon.unl.edu/lynne
Phone: 1-402-472-8281
"We are always only one failed generational transfer of knowledge away from
darkest ignorance" (Herman Daly)
"Smith, David W"
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ISTS.OU.EDU> Re: Hostility over TBL
06/18/2008 03:30
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Please respond to
"Smith, David W"
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Dear All,
I’m a little stunned. I didn’t mean to start this, but I did say the word
first, so be it.
I first noticed this when I got course evaluations that that said my course
was poorly organized. I had never been so organized before. I was
over-organized, in my view. Obsessive-compulsive even. Nonetheless I had
three students who checked one of two boxes, well-organized or
poorly-organized. It was also clear that three or four students, but not
clear that they were the same ones, since I only had marginal frequency
tabulations, were giving me the lowest or next-lowest score for every item
that had four or five points.
I was puzzled by this and, being at Oklahoma at the time, consulted with
Dee Fink about it, who noticed the consistent pattern of low scores. I
hadn’t realized the pattern was there until he pointed it out.
This made it clear that there were a few consistently and persistently
unhappy campers. But only a fraction, by no means a large fraction.
I later learned from some other faculty that there was a group of students
who avoided me when I taught Introductory biostatistics, a course which
rotated among several faculty. I do know that there was usually a group of
people who never came back for the second session of class. I filled up the
first session with working through a sample RA, group selection, a sample
problem session, and all the other ordinary business of organizing a class.
I later concluded that this was probably good for everybody involved. I do
think I ended up with happier students.
We would like all our students to be just like those in Lake Wobegon, that
is, above average. As a statistician I know this won’t ever happen.
Some students are remarkably amenable to the whole approach using TBL,
other active learning strategies, and PBL techniques, a related but
different technique common in medical schools. I have had several students
from the air force and the Canadian military who have had training in how
to make groups work well and they have plunged right in and their groups
have soared. Other groups stumble interminably. I would like to think that
making a TBL team work well is just a technical matter, but I know better.
Students come to us often because they are competent, at least at
something, and have been successful, at least in some way. They must have
expectations of success and want to be sure that they will be successful,
in the same way they have been before. Something new and different must be
very scary to many competent, successful people, especially if they have a
risk averse personality. Their ability gives them improved capacity to
express their dissatisfaction in writing and verbally.
The amount of learning that can go on with TBL is open-ended. I think that
this, by itself, makes many students uncomfortable and insecure.
One of ways I have described the expectations of many students,
facetiously, is that they want to sit back, let me tell them what is
important in lectures, make sure I repeat the formulas from the text
perfectly, and then repeat 70% of it back on an exam, with extensive errors
in details and poorly organized, and then get a good grade. TBL does not
permit them to sit back and relax for the first five weeks of class, not
when I give an RA about three chapters at the second class session and
plunge them into doing problems at the same session. I always wanted them
to start doing their readings and problems the first week. With TBL, none
of us have any choice in the matter.
I would never go back to lecture-recitation format. I took many classes
this way, several times from wonderful lecturers who were also famous
people in their field. This is no way to learn to do something, only a way
to learn to listen to someone else explain it so well that I cannot repeat
it three hours later. I learned much more from teachers who opened up the
frontiers of research within 5-10 weeks of the start of class. The didn’t
know about the modern terms of TBL, active learning, etc, but they used the
techniques often enough to be clear to me that this is the way to go,
whatever the format, procedure, or terms.
Regards,
David Smith
David W. Smith, Ph.D., M.P.H.
Biostatistics Division
San Antonio Campus
University of Texas School of Public Health
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