The role of the ‘think-pair-share’ active learning strategy in influencing content knowledge and self-confidence of undergraduate students in a large enrollment geoscience course

Abstract

This study explores the relationship between the self-confidence and content knowledge of undergraduate students in a large enrollment geoscience course following an active-learning think-pair-share (TPS) activity, and whether high confidence necessarily leads to overconfidence. We used a pre-experimental, one group pre-test – post-test design, and an audience response system to record students’ responses to a series of questions covering geoscience concepts and the level of confidence that students had in their answers. During each class session, the students were first asked to engage in one or two TPS activities before responding to a series of questions, focusing on content knowledge and self-confidence. We analyzed the data using exploratory data analysis, boxplots, bar graphs, the Wilcoxon signed-rank test and the Chi-Square test. Results indicate that the content knowledge and self-confidence of students increased after students participated in TPS activities. 55% of students correctly answered the pre-activity question, and 74% correctly answered the post-activity question. The results also reveal that while the TPS activity helped to improve self-confidence from a median of 3 to 4 on a five-point scale, the proportion of responses from students that were overconfident in their abilities decreased from 22% in the pre-activity to 13% in the post-activity.