Abstract
Blueberry growers in Maine attend annual Cooperative Extension presentations given by university faculty members. These presentations cover topics, such as, how to prevent plant disease and monitor for insect pests. In 2012, in order to make the sessions more interactive and promote learning, clicker questions and peer discussion were incorporated into the presentations. Similar to what has been shown at the undergraduate level, after peer discussion, more blueberry growers gave correct answers to multiple-choice questions than when answering independently. Furthermore, because blueberry growers are characterized by diverse levels of education, experience in the field etc., we were able to determine whether demographic factors were associated with changes in performance after peer discussion. Taken together, our results suggest that clicker questions and peer discussion work equally well with adults from a variety of demographic backgrounds without disadvantaging a subset of the population and provide an important learning opportunity to the least formally educated members. Our results also indicate that clicker questions with peer discussion were viewed as a positive addition to university-related informal science education sessions.
Highlights
Having students respond to multiple-choice format questions designed to test conceptual understanding using personal response systems or ‘‘clickers’’ is one strategy that has been used to promote interaction and learning in K-12 and undergraduate courses
This study investigates several questions regarding the use of clickers in informal education settings for adults including: 1) Does peer discussion improve performance of adult learners answering questions with clickers in an informal science setting? 2) Do members of a mixed demographic group benefit from peer discussion? and 3) Are clicker questions viewed as a positive addition to university-related informal science education?
Authors S.A. and F.D. each spoke for 30 minutes and were the only speakers to use a combination of clicker questions and peer discussion during their presentations
Summary
Having students respond to multiple-choice format questions designed to test conceptual understanding using personal response systems or ‘‘clickers’’ is one strategy that has been used to promote interaction and learning in K-12 and undergraduate courses (reviewed in [1,2]). Instructors who use clickers and clicker questions often pair that use with an approach called peer instruction. This approach encourages students to verbalize their thinking and interact with their peers to arrive at an answer [3]. In one commonly used mode of peer instruction, students first answer a concept question individually, discuss the question with peers, and resubmit the response, all before the answer to the question is revealed. The instructor discusses the answer choices and often shows a bar chart of the student responses. The bar chart of student results gives both instructors and students immediate feedback on how well a concept is understood
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