Case for a Cooperative Studio Classroom: Teaching Petrology in a Different Way, The

We derived some of the most successful class activities, including Wirth's, from presentations at the NSF sponsored "Teaching Petrology in the 21st Century" Workshop (Montana State University, Bozeman, MT, June 9-15, 2003), part of the larger program: "On the Cutting Edge: Workshops for Geoscience Faculty." Some descriptions of activities introduced at the workshop can be found at http://serc.carleton.edu/NAGTWorkshops/petrology03/redirect.html. Table 3 lists four of the class projects rated most highly by students that can be found on the workshop web site.

CLASS ASSESSMENT

To provide insight and to help maintain objectivity, a colleague in the Bush Teaching Scholars Program served as a teaching consultant. His participation was key because he worked closely with the students (meeting weekly with them) to provide formative assessments of the class. Additionally, because he was intimately familiar with the project, he provided valuable conversation and suggestions.

Some instructors have collected hard data demonstrating that studio teaching promotes better learning (including problem solving skills and better understanding of key concepts), improved student attitudes, and better grades (e.g., Beichner and Saul, 2003). While documenting student attitudes and grades was no problem, I found it extremely difficult to make objective comparisons of learning outcomes between Petrology taught as a studio class, and the way I taught it before. If only the format of the class had changed, comparison of exam and project grades, and use of traditional assessments would be adequate to evaluate improvements in student learning. As me consultant and I started the assessment process, however, we soon realized that the goals of the class had changed significantly, and that previously used exams and grading techniques were not appropriate for the redesigned class. Additionally, the enthusiasm and time invested by the instructor, TA, and consultant were much greater than in previous semesters. Consequently, although we can use many indicators to compare learning in the class before and after reformatting, we have no quantitative data. Others have encountered this problem, as alluded to above, while trying to assess the effectiveness of alternative teaching strategies.

Table 4 summarizes five different ways we assessed the class. Our multipronged approach was designed to provide formative assessments to allow adjustments and fine tuning during the semester, and also to allow evaluation of the effectiveness of the studio approach to teaching.

STUDENT PERSPECTIVE

One goal of the redesigned class was to promote higher levels of learning (not just content memorization). Although I designed the curriculum with this in mind, I realized that I needed a way to assess this goal. So, I used an instrument based on what is now commonly called Bloom's Taxonomy (Bloom et al., 1956) to see what the students thought they had learned (Table 5). Bloom and his colleagues classified the cognitive domain (now frequently equated with learning) into six categories: knowledge, comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis and evaluation. According to Bloom et al. (1956) this order goes from low order cognition (recall of memorized information) to higher order cognition (greater intellectual development). During the first class meeting, I asked students what sorts of learning they thought they would experience during the semester. They responded in the same order in which Bloom et al. (1956) presented their categories, indicating they believed that knowledge (learning facts) would be the most significant aspect of the course. At the end of the semester, however, they said that most of their learning was of higher order. Much fell in the application category. Comprehension came second, evaluation third and knowledge was only in fourth place. The students' conclusions agreed with those of the instructor and the consultant. Throughout the semester, the students had amazed us with their ability to synthesize and apply data in different situations.