Power of Course Design to Increase Student Engagement and Learning, The

Peer Review, Winter 2007 by Fink, L Dee

The second story involves Bill Weeks, a professor of computer engineering at the University of Missouri-Rolla who used the ICD model to redesign a course on coding theory (2003). Weeks had been using the traditional teaching strategy of lectures and homework in this mathintensive course, but students felt overwhelmed by the material, frustrated, and apathetic, and they gave the course low evaluations.

After attending a workshop on ICD, he wrote new learning goals, applied the principles of active learning and educative assessment, and used team-based learning-a teaching strategy that uses small groups in a distinct and powerful way.

In the redesigned version of the course, students did just as well in learning foundational knowledge (as evidenced by their performance on the same exams), even though he spent less class time focused specifically on that kind of learning. And they did much better on the new learning goals, which he had not even been attempting to promote before. But the major change reported by the professor was in student morale in the class:

The student response was nothing less than phenomenal. I never could have anticipated such drastic improvements in student morale. I was especially surprised that the students were motivated to work so hard. Many students reported to me that they enjoyed the workload in the class.

And seeing that change-students working harder and enjoying it more-had a predictable effect on the professor: "Teaching such an excited group of students was an unforgettable experience. It made my job seem worthwhile and very fulfilling. I will be feeding off that student excitement for years."

Conclusions

Professors in higher education are finding that, when they use the model of integrated course design to restructure the learning experience, students respond by becoming more engaged in the learning process and by achieving more significant kinds of learning. This happens because students become cocreators of their own learning, the intended learning has greater meaning, and students are given a wider range of tools to create this learning-often including the opportunity to work closely with other students on promoting each other's learning.

References

Bloom, B. S., ed. 1956. Taxonomy of Educational Objectives. The classification of educational goals, handbook I: Cognitive domain. New York: David McKay.

Bonwell, C. C., and J. A. Eison. 1991. Active learning: Creating excitement in the classroom. ASHE-ERIC Higher Education Report 1. Washington, DC: George Washington University.

Fallahi, C. R. 2006 (submitted for publication). Redesign of a lifespan development course using Fink's Taxonomy.

Fink, L. D. 2003. Creating significant learning experiences: An integrated approach to designing college courses. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Weeks, W. 2003. Incorporation of active learning strategies in the engineering classroom. Proceedings of the 2003 ASEE Midwest Ssection Meeting, Rolla, MO. University of Missouri-Rolla.

Wiggins, G. 1998. Educative assessment: designing assessments to inform and improve student performance. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.