Students' Perceptions of Group Communication Skills in an Active Learning Environment

Curtin University uses an active learning framework in its first-year chemistry units to help students engage better with content, compared with traditional didactic lectures. It is intended that students develop other skills such as communication. However, these skills are not always explicitly tau...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Yeung, Alexandra, Ahern, Suzanne
Other Authors: Schultz, Madeleine
Format: Book Chapter
Published: Springer 2019
Subjects:
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/79883
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author Yeung, Alexandra
Ahern, Suzanne
author2 Schultz, Madeleine
author_facet Schultz, Madeleine
Yeung, Alexandra
Ahern, Suzanne
author_sort Yeung, Alexandra
building Curtin Institutional Repository
collection Online Access
description Curtin University uses an active learning framework in its first-year chemistry units to help students engage better with content, compared with traditional didactic lectures. It is intended that students develop other skills such as communication. However, these skills are not always explicitly taught and we assume students are proficient communicators when they enter the classroom. This study aimed to create activities targeting development of group communication. An examination of how students communicate with each other within their group as they completed their learning activities was conducted. The Talk Science Primer was used as a framework for the learning design of the activities where students work through four goals to develop communication skills (Michaels and O’Connor in Talk science primer. TERC, Cambridge, 2012). Students (n = 452) enrolled in an introductory-level chemistry unit who had very little chemistry background were divided into two groups—intervention and non-intervention. The interventions were activities conducted in class throughout the semester. Students’ perceptions of the interventions were determined, particularly the usefulness of the interventions in developing their communication skills.
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institution Curtin University Malaysia
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spelling curtin-20.500.11937-798832020-12-17T01:33:09Z Students' Perceptions of Group Communication Skills in an Active Learning Environment Yeung, Alexandra Ahern, Suzanne Schultz, Madeleine Schmid, Siegbert Lawrie, Gwendolyn 1302 - Curriculum and Pedagogy 0399 - Other Chemical Sciences Curtin University uses an active learning framework in its first-year chemistry units to help students engage better with content, compared with traditional didactic lectures. It is intended that students develop other skills such as communication. However, these skills are not always explicitly taught and we assume students are proficient communicators when they enter the classroom. This study aimed to create activities targeting development of group communication. An examination of how students communicate with each other within their group as they completed their learning activities was conducted. The Talk Science Primer was used as a framework for the learning design of the activities where students work through four goals to develop communication skills (Michaels and O’Connor in Talk science primer. TERC, Cambridge, 2012). Students (n = 452) enrolled in an introductory-level chemistry unit who had very little chemistry background were divided into two groups—intervention and non-intervention. The interventions were activities conducted in class throughout the semester. Students’ perceptions of the interventions were determined, particularly the usefulness of the interventions in developing their communication skills. 2019 Book Chapter http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/79883 10.1007/978-981-13-6998-8 Springer restricted
spellingShingle 1302 - Curriculum and Pedagogy
0399 - Other Chemical Sciences
Yeung, Alexandra
Ahern, Suzanne
Students' Perceptions of Group Communication Skills in an Active Learning Environment
title Students' Perceptions of Group Communication Skills in an Active Learning Environment
title_full Students' Perceptions of Group Communication Skills in an Active Learning Environment
title_fullStr Students' Perceptions of Group Communication Skills in an Active Learning Environment
title_full_unstemmed Students' Perceptions of Group Communication Skills in an Active Learning Environment
title_short Students' Perceptions of Group Communication Skills in an Active Learning Environment
title_sort students' perceptions of group communication skills in an active learning environment
topic 1302 - Curriculum and Pedagogy
0399 - Other Chemical Sciences
url http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/79883