FLIPPED LECTURES IN CHEMISTRY USING PERSONAL RESPONSE SYSTEMS AND PEER INSTRUCTION

The objective was to use technology to complement and make better use of the lecturer-student contact time. There is evidence from a study in chemistry teaching at MMU that personal response systems can lead to significant educational gains in this area. The aim was to release the contact time for more interactive learning using the flipped teaching model. With the transfer of information occurring out of class, via screencasts, the in-class time could focus on the assimilation of this knowledge using the mass polling response quizzes. The aim being to engage students during class through a sequence of questioning and discussion. Students were asked to respond again to the same question after a short discussion with someone in the class who had responded with a different answer to themselves. They were then given 1-2 mins to convince each other who had been correct, a second polling of the same question was then carried out and the differences between the two responses was compared followed by an explanation of the correct answer. This approach has provided a fertile environment for peer instruction as well as being extremely useful in engaging the majority of class during the flipped lectures. In most cases, an increase in the percentage of right answers was recorded between the two rounds after the peer discussion. A feedback survey has shown that 88% of students thought that the quizzes enhanced the lectures and all of these students agreed that the quizzes had helped their understanding. In addition, these students had welcomed the opportunity to discuss the questions with their peers during class. This paper will report the preliminary results from this study and describe the educational gains that are possible using this student-centred teaching method.