Steelcase Active Learning Center Grant: Proposed Research

During the two-year Active Learning Center Grant period, the Grant Team will be researching instructor experiences.

Problem Statement:  Active learning strategies are difficult to integrate into instruction in traditionally designed learning spaces.
  
Research Questions: 

• How is instructor behavior influenced by a flexible, bring-your-own-device (BYOD) learning space, compared to a traditionally designed, inflexible, wired learning space?
  • How does instructor movement different in the two spaces?
  • How does instructor-student engagement differ?
• How does learning space design affect instructors' perceived ability to conduct active learning?

Contextual Information:  At the Newton Gresham Library, teaching librarians are hesitant to implement more student centered teaching methods, such as active learning, because current instructional environments are traditionally designed, inflexible, wired learning spaces.  The intent of this research study is to examine how learning space design impacts an instructor's use of active learning.

Investigating how instructor experiences in a flexible, bring-your-own-device (BYOD) learning space compare to a traditionally designed, wired computer classroom, cannot be done effectively using quantitative or qualitative methods alone. A mixed methods approach must be taken. Requiring the collection of both quantitative (closed-ended) and qualitative (open-ended) data, a mixed method research design garners a more complete understanding of the research problem by providing both statistics and contextual information. (Creswell, 2014)

Our research design is comprised of four elements, pre-survey, active learning training, observation, and post-survey, which will be conducted with four different cohorts over two years.

A pre-survey containing quantitative (multiple choice, Likert scale, etc.) and qualitative (short answer) questions will be administered via Qualtrics, a secure, online survey tool, to participating instructors at the beginning of the data collection phase (Jul. 2019, Jan. 2020, Aug./Sept. 2020, or Jan. 2021). This will allow us to collect instructor information and establish a baseline regarding perceptions of their ability to conduct and engage students in active learning, and how/if learning space design has affected that ability. Pre-surveys will be confidential and held electronically in a secure folder only accessible to the research team. Surveys are an efficient collection tool to gain self-reported information about participants' thoughts, feelings, perceptions, behaviors, or attitudes. (Hanington & Martin, 2017) They can be completed in a short amount of time and are easily analyzed.  Surveys are frequently used in social science research and are an appropriate data collection tool for this study.

Training on active learning strategies and use of the flexible, BYOD learning space will be provided to participating instructors following the pre-survey.  The active learning training will ensure instructors have the same basic understanding of active learning strategies and techniques while introducing them to the new learning space. NGL’s teaching librarians are highly encouraged to participate continuously in training and other professional development activities to improve their work performance and encourage experimentation with new ideas, making training an effective intervention to be used in this research study.

Observation, documented via video recording and/or hand-written notes, during the semester (Fall 2019, Spring 2020, Fall 2020, or Spring 2021) of the instructor’s library instruction sessions, two in the traditional classroom and two in the active learning center, will be interpreted, using the Teaching Dimensions Observation Protocol (TDOP), to map an instructor's movement through the room and pinpoint specific engagement with individuals or groups of students. With this information, we can illustrate how a learning space's design affects instructor movement and the number of instructor-student engagements. Video recordings and digitized notes will be confidential and held electronically within a secure folder only accessible to the research team. Copies of individual instructor's video recordings and/or notes will be available to those instructors by request. Observation is the attentive looking and systematic recording of people, artifacts, environments, events, behaviors, and interactions. (Hanington & Martin, 2017) It is used extensively in ethnographic research, because it enables the researcher to make inferences about participants' ways of thinking and feeling. (Saldaña, 2011) With the rise of systematic teacher appraisal and lesson evaluation, observation in the classroom has become commonplace as a method to measure teacher performance and as a training tool for pre-service educators. (Wragg, 2002) The TDOP is an appropriate assessment tool for the research study as it is customizable, will provide robust and nuanced depictions of classroom dynamics, and will provide continuity with assessments named in SHSU’s Equality Enhancement Plan. (Wisconsin Center for Education Research, n.d.)  Observation makes an ideal data collection method for this study with the benefit of eliminating undo stress on participating instructors.

A post-survey, identical to the pre-survey, will be administered via Qualtrics and in tandem with the Steelcase Education Learning Environment Evaluation measurement tool to participating instructors following the completion of four observations (Dec. 2019, May 2020, Dec. 2019, or May 2019). Comparing the post-survey data to the pre-survey data allows us to gauge change in the instructors' perceptions of their ability to conduct and engage students in active learning and how/if learning space design has affected that ability. The post-survey will also allow instructors to indicate their willingness to participate in supplemental interviews. Interviews will not be used in this study, but may be used in further investigations or for professional development purposes. Post-surveys will be confidential and held electronically in a secure folder only accessible to the research team.