Topic: Using SPARK in Large Lecture Courses
Last month, about 15 SPARK users –new and veteran– gathered to enjoy lunch and share strategies for using technology to manage large lecture classes. Presenting were Dan Gerber from the School of Public Health, and John Gerber from the Department of Plant, Soil, and Insect Sciences.
Both instructors aim to create a paper-free, interactive course that will engage students without using tests. Dan Gerber encouraged faculty to help students take a more active role in their learning. As he remarked, “students are used to showing up to class and sitting there like lumps on a log. That’s the toughest cultural change we have to make for these students.” John Gerber wanted to change student behavior with regard to the environment rather than demand that they memorize material.
How can professors increase opportunities for student participation without being overwhelmed by the resulting workload?
John Gerber and Dan Gerber demonstrated their most successful strategies, including:
Keep a Clean SPARK Course
Dan Gerber emphasized the importance of maintaining a well-organized course to help students quickly find what they need. “Keep it simple, keep it clean.”
Post PowerPoint Presentations
To encourage students to pay attention and contribute to lectures, post your PowerPoint presentations on SPARK, eliminating much of students’ need to take notes in class.
Encourage Community with Discussions
Use Groups in conjunction with the Discussion tool. Although in large lecture courses students remain relatively anonymous, “online they get to know each other” in small groups of 15, according to Dan Gerber. Motivate student discussion by awarding more points to students who post with an above-average frequency. Over the course of the semester, the average frequency gets higher and higher as students attempt to earn more points.
Create Assignments Based on Course Readings
Create weekly Assignments based on course readings. Students write up brief responses that can be skimmed and awarded points.
Grade More Quickly with Grade Forms
Use Grade Forms to grade written work. These provide a set of quick, clickable feedback descriptions that you write beforehand. For large classes, they can make providing feedback much faster.
Create Assessments for Student Review
Create Assessments that students can take an unlimited number of times. Students can use these to learn course content in an alternative way or to review material for exams. Dan Gerber likes to make an introductory Assessment based on the syllabus, with questions like, “I have read the syllabus,” “I have access to a computer,” and “I have purchased my PRS clicker.”
Bring PRS into the Classroom
With Personal Response System (PRS) software, faculty members can present multiple-choice questions in class that students immediately answer with a remote control device commonly called a “clicker.” Faculty can use PRS to give in-class quizzes, take student surveys, build interactivity into lecture courses, and take attendance. According to John Gerber, PRS “wakes them up.” PRS results can be imported into the SPARK Grade Book.
Reward Student Participation
Give students access to My Grades and My Progress tools to allow them to monitor their own performance in the course.
Want to know more?
The SPARK Community of Practice brings together faculty who are interested in sharing best practices for using SPARK and technology in the classroom. To learn more, contact the Instructional Media Lab.
For more information on PRS, visit http://www.umass.edu/prs
For more information on SPARK, visit, visit http://www.oit.umass.edu/spark/faculty