Strategies to Address Common Challenges When Teaching in an Active Learning Classroom

Abstract

Active learning classrooms (ALCs) provide opportunities for increased student engagement and interaction with classmates and the instructor. Reports indicate that students in these classrooms outperform their peers in traditional classrooms (Brooks 2011;Walker, Brooks, and Baepler 2011). In addition to these advantages, ALCs also present challenges for instructors who are used to teaching in more traditional classrooms and for students who are used to learning in these environments. In this chapter, we outline common teaching challenges in ALCs and provide strategies for overcoming them. These challenges and strategies come from the experiences of instructors we interact with in our work as teaching consultants and from our own experience teaching in ALCs. We begin with some background describing the differences between traditional classrooms and ALCs. Differences between ALCs and Traditional ClassroomsA traditional classroom is designed with student seats facing forward with easy sightlines to a central focal point at the front of the room. A board, a projection screen, and an instructor podium are all located within these sightlines. Students ideally have unimpeded visual access to the instructor, the board, and the projection screen, and they are able to take notes on a desktop surface during the presentation of classroom material. This type of arrangement favors instructional approaches that involve transmission of information from the instructor to the students. It is possible to have student-student and student-instructor interactions in these classrooms, but the physical constraints of the seating present challenges in doing so.

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