Why incorporate active learning techniques?
Research suggests that audience attention in lectures starts to wane every 10-20 minutes. Incorporating active learning techniques once or twice during a 50-minute class (twice to or thrice for a 75-minute class) will encourage student engagement. Active learning also:
•Reinforces important material, concepts, and skills.
•Provides more frequent and immediate feedback to students.
•Addresses different student learning styles.
•Provides students with an opportunity to think about, talk about, and process course material.
•Creates personal connections to the material for students, which increases their motivation to learn.
•Allows students to practice important skills, such as collaboration, through pair and group work.
•Builds self-esteem through conversations with other students.
•Creates a sense of community in the classroom through increased student-student and instructor-student interaction.