Jack Eichler
As part of our ATS workshop series, faculty from CSULB and beyond share case studies and key lessons learned from implementing new approaches in their teaching practice.
Dr. Jack Eichler
Dr. Jack Eichler is an Associate Professor of Teaching at the University of California, Riverside. His focus of scholarly activity lies in developing, implementing, and assessing more engaging learning environments for large enrollment general chemistry courses.
Insights on Using Technology in the Classroom:
I was the principal investigator on an NSF project called Transforming Undergraduate Education in STEM (TUES) that developed, implemented, and disseminated a series of problem-based case studies in our two-year general chemistry/organic chemistry sequence. I was also PI on an NSF Improving Undergraduate STEM Education (IUSE) project in which we adapted our problem-based studies to be used as in-class activities for flipped classroom modules.
A related research study demonstrated that implementing 4-6 flipped classroom modules in one quarter of general chemistry significantly increased the amount of active learning that takes place in lecture, and students participating in the flipped classroom modules performed better in the course than students in traditional lectures (Eichler and Peeples, 2016, Chemical Education Research and Practice). A recent follow-up study that utilized a randomized controlled trial experiment indicates the online learning environment led to most of the performance gains in a model flipped classroom study group (Casselman, Atit, Eichler, et al., 2020, Journal of Chemical Education). Future work will focus on studying how online learning interventions might be specifcally tailored for different types of learning objectives.
Student response systems called clickers and problem-based case studies were used to increase student engagement in 250–500 seat lecture halls.
Preliminary evaluation efforts found the flipped classroom modules provided convenient access to learning materials that increased the use of active learning in lecture and resulted in a significant improvement in the course grade point average (GPA) compared to a non-flipped class. These results suggest this approach to implementing a flipped classroom can act as a model for integrating active learning into large enrollment introductory chemistry courses that yields successful outcomes.
Students generally provide positive feedback about the flipped classroom modules, though some students periodically indicate they feel they would rather have the instructor teach them in lecture as opposed to doing some of the learning independently prior to lecture. It is important to inform the students why we are using this type of instructional scaffold and how it has been found to help students be more successful.
