Toward a full(Er) implementation of active learning

Abstract

Many university statistics instructors are interested in teaching with active-learning approaches in their classrooms. In this article, we attend to active learning in three ways. First, we review how the statistics education community has addressed issues surrounding active learning implementation to date. Second, we describe how our project used design experiment methodology to create active-learning materials. Finally, using embedded case study methodology, we report on factors that impacted the extent to which statistics instructors facilitated active learning using our project's materials. We describe properties of classroom interactions that led to full implementation of active learning and show how the unifying theme of relinquishing mathematical and statistical authority had explanatory power to inform ways instructors might effectively implement active learning.