TRANSITION OF A MARINE GEOLOGY COURSE FROM TEACHING-CENTERED TOWARD LEARNING-CENTERED

Innovative teaching in my senior-level marine geology course occurred episodically. From the middle 1960s to 1989 the course was a teaching-centered lecture course. The syllabus listed topics to be presented; the students listened to lectures and were tested for their knowledge of the course material. The most "innovative" aspect of the course was my use of data, charts, and samples for the examination questions. Students would individually examine the materials during the examination period as the basis for answering the questions. Then in 1989 I changed one of the four-days-per-week lectures into a meeting in a laboratory where data, charts, and samples were laid out for the students to examine and answer questions about. They worked informally, mostly in groups that were not deliberately formed, and came to me with their answers for verification, and a very brief discussion.

In 1994 I changed the format of the course entirely to cooperative learning, particularly the jigsaw format. The syllabus was changed to a list of student activities by which the students gave some evidence of their learning. Some of the materials formerly used in the "lab" became part of the structured group activities. Tests to assess learning were replaced by projects as better assessments. The typical format was for each group to read a different short assignment on a concept-say, wave energy, its flux, and variation along shore-guided by different focus questions. In class, each group discussed their written answers to their focus question, arrived at a consensus, and then decided how they would later "teach" that information when all the groups were re-formed into mixed groups comprising a member from each original group. The mixed groups integrated the information from all readings, and each student summarized the results. The next assignment for the original groups was a problem to solve by applying knowledge of the concept just discussed. Concept and problem alternated until it was time to apply the total knowledge and application to a project, such as estimating the longshore transport of sediment in the surf zone by monitoring real-time wave data. One project involved a self-selected and self-guided shoreline field trip. The students had reinforced their learning by, in turn, reading, writing, discussing, teaching, listening, writing, problem-solving, and teaching problem-solving for each concept before applying the total to a project. Attendance and student evaluations of the course were far better than in the lecture format.

Were I still teaching, I would change the course again, because I have a better, though still only partial, understanding of how students learn. For instance, I would use a wave tank and have the students observe the wave behavior as the foundation for discussion, leaving the reading of the literature until they had arrived at the need to have names for the concepts and to connect their observations to the current knowledge of marine geology. Through structured group discussion they, rather than I, would define the problems to be solved by applying their knowledge of the concepts, an approach more likely to lead to deeper understanding. And I would use far more classroom assessment of student learning to alter the lessons immediately for enhanced learning.