What Makes Lectures ‘Unmissable’? Insights into Teaching Excellence and Active Learning

Abstract

This research explores 'teaching excellence' by examining the perceptions of geography academics and students at Brunel University as to what makes a lecture 'unmissable'. The findings from 10 interviews with lecturers and five focus groups with undergraduate students suggest that whilst there is probably no such thing as an entirely unmissable lecture, attendance rates are significantly enhanced by three key factors: (i) a high degree of participation and interactivity ('active learning'), (ii) a clear structure which enables integrative links to be more easily made, and (iii) a passionate, enthusiastic lecturer, who can bring a subject to life for students. As research has shown that a high degree of interactivity encourages deeper approaches to learning, the paper argues that a move away from conventional lecturing towards more applied methods and small-group teaching may be a way of improving teaching excellence. Yet as large-group lectures are unlikely to be replaced any time soon, making them as participative as possible is one way to ensure that higher cognitive functions are at least partially acquired.

Protocol: Entrepreneurship in the area of Marketing. Comparing PBL vs active lectures

“…Este tipo de docencia permite asegurar dos de los tres pilares de una docencia excelente (Revell & Wainwright, 2009). Por un lado, permite crear una estructura clara que permita a los alumnos hacer, más fácilmente, enlaces integradores entre los contenidos.…”

Lived Experience of Older Learners in an Online University

“…The advantages of using a qualitative approach is that the data collected are rich, contextual and detailed, enabling a more holistic analysis and explanation [25].…”

The Level of History Teachers’ Use Active Learning Methods and Technics

“…But, especially the big and telling-based classes could pose a hindrance to encourage active learning for both educators and students (Buckley, Bain, Luginbuhl, & Dyer, 2004;Klein, 2003). Literature underlines the importance of the fact that students should be able to discuss the learning process through such technics as discussion, problem solving, presentations, group working and role playing and that this process should be inter-active as much as possible so that they could take part in it (Gibbs, 1992;Revell & Wainwright, 2009). Additionally, students should be prepared with the required information and confident to be able to participate in group discussions about the basic concepts while coming to the class.…”

“…Additionally, students should be prepared with the required information and confident to be able to participate in group discussions about the basic concepts while coming to the class. It has been notified by the academicians that preparations works like reading the texts before the class increase the capacity and the confident of the students to participate in the class (Revell & Wainwright, 2009;Scheyvens et al, 2008;Williams, 1992).…”