[RUME] Use of Clickers for College Math Teaching

Wed May 13 16:56:41 EDT 2009

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Jerry Becker (2009) recently forwarded a message to Math-Teach list 
titled "Use of Clickers for College Math Teaching" from Samuel King 
of the Mathematics Education Centre at Loughborough University in 
England.

Clicker expert Derek Bruff (2009), provides an online bibliography 
[Bruff (2009b)] containing references relevant to clicker usage in 
mathematics & statistics courses at <http://tinyurl.com/o93rd4>.

What good are clickers? In the abstract of "The Case for Classroom 
Clickers - A Response to Bugeja" [Hake (2008)], I wrote [slightly 
edited, bracketed by lines "HHHHH. . . . "]

HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
Perhaps the most dramatic . . . .[evidence for the effectiveness of 
clickers]. . .  has been provided by Eric Mazur [see e.g.: Mazur 
(1996), Crouch & Mazur (2001), Crouch et al. (2007), Fagen et al. 
(2002)], who increased the class-average normalized learning gain <g> 
on a standardized test of conceptual understanding of Newtonian 
mechanics by a factor of about two when he switched from traditional 
passive-student lectures to clicker-assisted "Peer Instruction" (PI). 
. . .[Lasry (2008) has shown that low-tech flashcards are equally 
effective in promoting student learning as measured by normalized 
gains.]. . . . In addition, clickers: (1) have contributed to the 
spread of the PI approach by providing a relatively easy and 
attractive bridge from traditional lectures to greater interactivity, 
(2) allow instructors to obtain real-time student feedback in 
histogram form, thus "making students' thinking visible and promoting 
critical listening, evaluation, and argumentation in the class,"  (3) 
archive student responses so as to improve questions and contribute 
to education research. 

 From a broader perspective, clickers may contribute to the spread of 
"interactive engagement" methods shown [Hake 1998a,b)] to be 
relatively effective in introductory physics instruction - i.e., 
methods designed to promote conceptual understanding through the 
active engagement of students in heads-on (always) and hands-on 
(usually) activities that yield immediate feedback though discussion 
with peers and/or instructors.
HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

But does interactive engagement promote student learning in 
mathematics? Take, for example, the undergraduate calculus reform 
movement. According to the listing by Przemyslaw Bogacki at 
<http://archives.math.utk.edu/calculus/crol.html>, about 40 
(primarily U.S.) universities took part. One can estimate that 
millions of dollars and hundreds of wo(man) years have been expended 
on calculus reform.

Was calculus reform really needed? Has it really succeeded? Has it 
really failed? Diametrically opposite answers will be given by the 
two opposing armies of the Math Wars [see, e.g., "Mathematically 
Correct" <http://www.mathematicallycorrect.com/> and Mathematically 
Sane
<http://MathematicallySane.com/home.asp>.

Unfortunately, until recently mathematicians had not bothered to 
develop a valid, consistently reliable, and widely accepted calculus 
version of the physics "Force Concept Inventory" (FCI) [Hestenes et 
al. (1992)] to gauge the need for, or the effects of, their calculus 
reform efforts - see e.g., "Can Mathematicians Learn Anything from 
Physics/Astronomy Education Research?" [Hake (2003)]. 

But help now appears to be on the way! [Epstein (2007, 2009).

Richard Hake, Emeritus Professor of Physics, Indiana University
24245 Hatteras Street, Woodland Hills, CA 91367
Honorary Member, Curmudgeon Lodge of  Deventer, The Netherlands.
<rrhake at earthlink.net>
<http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~hake/>
<http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~sdi/>
<http://HakesEdStuff.blogspot.com/>

REFERENCES
Becker, J. 2009. "Research: Impact of Clicker on Math Teaching." 
Math-Teach post of 13 May 2009 11:15:40-0500; online at  
<http://mathforum.org/kb/thread.jspa?threadID=1932749&tstart=0>.

Bruff, D. 2009a. "Teaching with Classroom Response Systems: Creating 
Active Learning Environments," Jossey-Bass.  Amazon.com information 
at <http://tinyurl.com/5otp9r>. Note the "Look Inside" feature that 
allows keyword searches. See also the description in Bruff's Blog at 
<http://derekbruff.com/teachingwithcrs/?page_id=36>.

Bruff,  D. 2008b. "Classroom Response Systems ("clickers") 
Bibliography," Vanderbilt Center for Teaching; online at 
<http://tinyurl.com/o93rd4>. "Most of the articles present some form 
of research on the effectiveness or impact of CRSs on student 
learning. The first group of articles are not discipline-specific; 
the later articles are grouped by discipline."

Crouch, C.H. & E. Mazur. 2001. "Peer Instruction: Ten years of 
experience and results," Am. J. Phys. 69: 970-977; online at 
<http://tinyurl.com/sbys4>.

Crouch, C.  J. Watkins, A. Fagen and E. Mazur. 2007. "Peer 
Instruction: Engaging students one-on-one, all at once" in "Reviews 
in Physics Education Research,"  edited by E.F. Redish and P. Cooney; 
online at <http://tinyurl.com/5vcke5>.

Epstein, J. 2007. Development and Validation of the Calculus Concept 
Inventory, in "Proceedings of the Ninth International Conference on 
Mathematics Education in a Global Community," 7-12 September, edited 
by Pugalee, Rogerson & Schinck; online at 
<http://math.unipa.it/~grim/21_project/21_charlotte_EpsteinPaperEdit.pdf> 
(48 kB). For more recent results see Epstein (2009).

Epstein, J. 2009. "Re: NYTimes article -- new results on the CCI," 
PhysLrnR post of 13 Jan 2009 20:24:22+0000; online at 
<http://tinyurl.com/r6dqrd>. To access the archives of PhysLnR one 
needs to subscribe, but that takes only a few minutes by clicking on 
<http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/physlrnr.html> and then 
clicking on "Join or leave the list (or change settings)."  If you're 
busy, then subscribe using the "NOMAIL" option under "Miscellaneous." 
Then, as a subscriber, you may access the archives and/or post 
messages at any time, while receiving NO MAIL from the list!

Fagen, A.P.,  C.H. Crou, & E. Mazur. 2002.  "Peer Instruction: 
Results from a Range of Classrooms," Phys. Teach. 40: 206-209; online 
at <http://tinyurl.com/sbys4>.

Hake, R.R. 1998a. "Interactive-engagement vs traditional methods: A 
six thousand- student survey of mechanics test data for introductory 
physics courses," Am. J. Phys. 66(1): 64-74; online at 
<http://tinyurl.com/3xuyqe> (84 kB).

Hake, R.R. 1998b. "Interactive- engagement methods in introductory 
mechanics courses," online at <http://tinyurl.com/2tg5d9> (108 kB) - 
a crucial companion paper to Hake (1998a).

Hake, R.R. 2003. "Can Mathematicians Learn Anything from 
Physics/Astronomy Education Research?" online on the OPEN! POD 
archives at <http://tinyurl.com/qeqxex>. Post of 3 Sep 2003 
12:26:34-0700 to ASSESS, Biopi-L, Chemed-L, EvalTalk, FYA-List, 
Math-Teach, Phys-L, PhysLrnR, & POD.

Hake, R.R. 2008. "The Case for Classroom Clickers - A Response to 
Bugeja"; online at 
<http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~hake/CaseForClickersJ.pdf> (716 kB) 
and as ref. 56 at
<http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~hake/>. The abstract is also at 
<http://hakesedstuff.blogspot.com/2008/12/case-for-classroom-clickers-response-to.html> 
with provision for comments. 

Hestenes, D., M. Wells, & G. Swackhamer. (1992).  "Force Concept 
Inventory," Phys. Teach. 30(3): 141-158; online (except for the test 
itself) at <http://modeling.asu.edu/R&E/Research.html>. The 1995 
revision by Halloun, Hake, Mosca, & Hestenes is online (password 
protected) at the same URL, and is currently available in 16 
languages: Chinese, Czech, English, Finnish, French, German, Greek, 
Italian, Malaysian, Persian, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Slovak, 
Swedish, & Turkish.

Lasry, N. 2008. "Clickers or Flashcards: Is There Really a 
Difference?" Phys. Teacher 46(4): 242-244, online to subscribers at 
<http://scitation.aip.org/dbt/dbt.jsp?KEY=PHTEAH&Volume=46&Issue=4>, 
also online to all at <http://tinyurl.com/sbys4>.

Mazur, E. 1997. "Peer instruction: A user's manual." Prentice-Hall. A 
description is online at
<http://mazur-www.harvard.edu/education/pi_manual.php>.