The Role of Memorising in Learning Science
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Team Leaders |
Sue Gordon Jackie Nicholas |
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Project Team |
Miriam Frommer |
Department of Physiology |
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Ian Cooper |
School of Physics |
Aims and Significance of the Project
Memorising is commonly used by students in learning and yet memorising as part of the process of learning and understanding is not well understood by students and university teachers within science faculties. We hypothesise that the quality of classroom teaching (as opposed to what students perceive as good teaching) and of formal assessment can be improved by university teachers being more aware of the critical role of memorising in the learning and assessment of students.
The project investigates what a sample of university teachers within the Faculty perceive to be the role of memorising in their discipline and how they incorporate memorising in their teaching strategies and assessment. We will endeavour to improve the quality of the educational experience within the Science Faculty by helping increase the match between teacher expectations (that understanding is desirable) and student performance (that examinations must be passed at all costs).
Previous research has shown that university teachers? conceptions of science learning and teaching are fundamental to the quality of their students? knowledge (Prosser, Trigwell & Taylor, 1997; Trigwell, Prosser & Waterhouse, 1999). Our pilot study will survey university teachers from three disciplines within the Science Faculty - mathematics, physiology and physics - and will address the following research questions:
The project builds on the research experience of the project team leaders on students? conceptions of mathematics and approaches to learning it (Crawford, Gordon, Nicholas & Prosser, 1994a; 1994b; 1998) which has shown that many university students learn in ways which are not educationally desirable nor advantageous to their achievement. It provides opportunities for research and scholarship in science education for all in the project team.
Research Plan
Sample, Method and Analytic Framework
The sample will comprise 15 university teachers in the Science Faculty, 5 each from Mathematics, Physiology and Physics. Purposive sampling (Lincoln & Guba, 1985) will be used to ensure that we include in the sample: university teachers with various levels of teaching experience and classification; university teachers teaching different levels of undergraduate study; university teachers of both genders and a range of cultural backgrounds.
Data will be collected by means of semi structured interviews. Each of the university teachers will be interviewed in depth by the relevant discipline member of the project team. Questions from student examinations will be used as prompts in the interviews to gain insights into how university teachers perceive their students? understandings are assessed. The interviews will be fully transcribed. Our collection and analysis of the data will be undertaken from a phenomenographic perspective previously used by the researchers (eg Crawford, Gordon, Nicholas & Prosser, 1994; Gordon, 1998). Phenomenographic research, pioneered by the Gothenburg school (Marton, 1988), describes the qualitatively different ways people relate to phenomena - in this case how university teachers relate to memorising in their discipline. This relational view of learning is consistent with our theoretical perspective which emphasises learning in context. The phenomenographic perspective provides a basis for us to identify from the interview transcripts categories of description of the role of memorising in our disciplines. These are the categories for conceptions of the role of memorising. We will then investigate and explicate relationships among university teachers? conceptions of the role of memorising, teaching strategies and assessment.
References
Crawford, K., Gordon, S., Nicholas, J. & Prosser, M. (1994a). Conceptions of mathematics and how it is learned: The perspectives of students entering university. Learning and Instruction, 4, 331-345.
Crawford, K., Gordon, S., Nicholas, J. & Prosser, M. (1994b). Students? reports of their learning about functions. In J. da Pont & J. Matos (Eds.), Proceedings of the Eighteenth Conference of the International Group for the Psychology of Mathematics Education, (Vol. 2, pp. 233-239). Lisbon: University of Lisbon.
Crawford, K., Gordon, S., Nicholas, J. & Prosser, M. (1998). Qualitatively different experiences of learning mathematics at university. Learning and Instruction, 8(5), 455-468.
Gordon, S. (1998). Understanding students learning statistics - An activity theory approach. Unpublished Doctoral Thesis, The University of Sydney, Sydney.
Lincoln, Y. & Guba, E. (1985). Naturalistic Inquiry. Beverly Hills, California: Sage Publications.
Marton, F. (1988). Describing and improving learning. In R. Schmeck (Ed.), Learning Strategies and Learning Styles (pp. 53-82). New York: Plenum Press.
Prosser, M., Trigwell, K. & Taylor, P. (1997). A phenomenographic study of academics? conceptions of science learning and teaching. Learning and Instruction, 4, 217-231.
Trigwell, K., Prosser, M. & Waterhouse, F. (1999). Relations between teachers? approaches to teaching and students? approaches to learning. Higher Education, 39, 57-70.
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Contact for Administration: |
Sue Gordon |
93514061 |
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Jackie Nicholas |
93514061 |