PHY138 - Teaching Techniques Survey - 2004/2005

We have surveyed PHY138 students about some of the teaching techniques that we have been using this year. We surveyed the students twice, with almost identical questions both times. The first survey was during the sixth week of classes (Oct. 20 - 22), and the second was during the twenty-first week of classes (March 9 - 11). The survey was conducted in tutorials.

I will not discuss the results in any detail: they mostly speak for themselves.

A pdf of the first survey form is available via the button to the right. Below we indicate changes in the survey form that was used in March.

669 students responded to the first survey; this was about 67% of the class.
311 students responded to the second survey; this is about 35% of currently enrolled students.

The answer to each question is a number between 1 and 7, with higher numbers positive; neutral is 4. The Summary column was calculated as follows:

The percentage of responses that were 1, 2, or 3 is the negative percentage.
The percentage of responses that were 3, 4, or 5 is the neutral percentage.
The percentage of responses that were 5, 6, or 7 is the positive percentage.
Unless two of the above are close to each other, only the highest is reported.

When

Mean

Summary

Comment

In-Class Questions

Fall 2004	5.32	76% positive	Conceptual questions in multiple-choice format; the students raise their hand to indicate their answers. In mid-October we converted to colored cardboard squares so that all students "vote" at once.
Winter 2005	5.15	69% positive	Except for the 3rd quarter, these continued in almost every class. Unless we can get RF clickers into Con Hall, we will make the colored cardboard squares part of the textbook package next year.

Small-Group Discussion in Class

Fall 2004	3.87	58% neutral	These were based on the In-Class Questions. The relatively poor evaluation is perhaps related to the fact that our students performed quite differently from their American counterparts on these questions, usually much better. Thus, the discussions were not always effective, but sometimes seemed to be very effective.
Winter 2005	3.33	53% negative 52% neutral

Demonstrations

Fall 2004	5.33	74% positive	Students like demonstrations. Making them effective learning tools is another story. A recent study is available here.
Winter 2005	4.59	62% neutral 57% positive

Flash Animations

Fall 2004	5.11	72% positive	With the exception of the third quarter, Flash animations were used in many classes. They are always available to the students via the web.
Winter 2005	5.45	79% positive

Pre-Class Quizzes

Fall 2004	3.71	53% neutral	These are nearly-trivial quizzes designed to insure that the students have read the text before class. Despite the students' relatively low opinion, I believe it is very important that the students read the text before class.
Winter 2005	4.14	54% neutral

MP Problem Sets

Fall 2004	4.58	58% positive	These are on-line problem sets using Mastering Physics software. We are very impressed with the quality of the questions and the philosophy used by the software.
Winter 2005	5.26	75% positive

Written Homework

Fall 2004	4.58	56% neutral 56% positive
Winter 2005	4.90	66% positive

McDermott Tutorials

Fall 2004

3.48

48% negative
54% neutral

See below

Tablet PC

Fall 2004	4.08	See below
Winter 2005	4.96	65% positive

Histograms

The above numeric information tells almost all of the story about these surveys. Nonetheless, for completeness, here are histograms of the results of the Winter 2005 survey.

In-Class Questions	Small-Group Discussion	Demonstrations	Flash Animations
Pre-Class Quizzes	MP Problem Sets	Written Homework	Tablet PC

About McDermott Tutorials

These are conceptual activities done by small groups of students. In the first and second quarters, we used these a fair amount. We discovered that the activities were often too simple for our students. When the level was correct, we believe they were quite effective.

In the third quarter of the course they were not used to a significant degree. In the fourth quarter, there were no available tutorials on the topics of the class so the workbooks were not used at all. Thus we did not ask this question in the Winter 2005 survey.

About the Tablet PC

With the exception of the third quarter, the Tablet PC is used as an electronic blackboard projected onto the main screen in Con Hall. In the third quarter, the classes were PowerPoint-like with the Tablet PC being used to annotate the slides of the presentation.

In the first survey the question that we asked was:

Instead of PowerPoint, the main content of the classes was delivered using the Journal program on a Tablet PC. Compared to a PowerPoint-based class like BIO150, how effective is this technology for your education?

It is not clear to me what we were asking in this mal-formed question, and I wrote it! A histogram of answers appears to the right. With the exception of the neutral answer 4 the shape is essentially flat.

Tablet PC vs PowerPoint

For the second survey the question was changed to:

The main content of the classes was delivered using the Journal program on a Tablet PC, with some PowerPoint slides and other information on the side screens. How effective was the use of the Tablet PC for your education?