Crouch and Mazur 2001, Peer Instruction: Ten years of experience and results, American Journal of Physics 69, 970
Lasry, Mazur, and Watkins 2008, Peer instruction: From Harvard to the two-year college, American Journal of Physics 76, 1066
Fagem, Crouch, and Mazur 2002, Peer Instruction: Results from a range of classrooms, Phys. Teach. 40, 206–209
More studies on the impact of the discussion among peers in the science class:
Hake 1998, Interactive-engagement versus traditional methods: A six-thousand-student survey of mechanics test data for introductory physics courses, American Journal of Physics 66, 64
Deslauriers, Shelew and Wieman 2011, Improved Learning in a Large-Enrollment Physics Class, Science 332 , 862
Both studies mentioned above analysed very big statistical samples: 6542 students in the first, 850 in the second. The size of the samples and the indisputable nature of the results, rule out any possibilty of statistical bias or any other sprurious effect. In both studies, the groups who utilized discussion as a pedagogical tool obtained better results than the control group by a considerable amount. We can confidently claim, that the improved efficacy of discussion in learning science, with respect to the traditional setting, is backed by smashing evidence.
The work by Deslauriers et al. is remarkable not only for being published in one of the most prestigious scientific journals, but also for a peculiar characteristic: it is the result of a bet between e renowned professor, by any account a very talented speaker, firmly beleiver in the traditional method, and a pos-doc fellow with little teaching experience, advocating discussion as a learning tool. Both taught according to their convictions repsectively to the control group and to the group in the experimental condition.
We ignore studies supporting the efficacy of the traditional method with respect to the discussion among peers. If there are any, please share this piece of information with us.
Eric Mazur's video on "peer instructions":
Epistemological Beliefs in Introductory Physics
Autor: David Hammer
Fonte: Cognition and Instruction, Vol. 12, No. 2 (1994), pp. 151-183
"Fundamental article on the epistemological believes of students. Hammer presents few case studies of students with both constructive and negative believes. He sets three dimensions for the believes about knowledge: fragmentary-coherent, by authority-independent, formulas-concepts. These three dimension are storngly related to one another. Hammer gives indication, not proves, that more limiting believes are not due to lack of intelligence or knowledge or will, because one of the students with this kind of attitude, Roger, is good at maths, he is well motivated, and knows as much as the others. Hammer shows that addressing this believes is the key thing to do in order to boost efficiency, because Roger thinks he does not have time to try understand."
More interesting papers
Epistemological Beliefs in Introductory Physics
Autor: David Hammer
Fonte: Cognition and Instruction, Vol. 12, No. 2 (1994), pp. 151-183
"Fundamental article on the epistemological believes of students. Hammer presents few case studies of students with both constructive and negative believes. He sets three dimensions for the believes about knowledge: fragmentary-coherent, by authority-independent, formulas-concepts. These three dimension are storngly related to one another. Hammer gives indication, not proves, that more limiting believes are not due to lack of intelligence or knowledge or will, because one of the students with this kind of attitude, Roger, is good at maths, he is well motivated, and knows as much as the others. Hammer shows that addressing this believes is the key thing to do in order to boost efficiency, because Roger thinks he does not have time to try understand."
Dialogic Argumentation as a Vehicle for Developing Young Adolescents’ Thinking
Autor: Deanna Kuhn and Amanda Crowell
Fonte: Psychological Science 22(4) 545–552 - ano 2011
"Absolutely fundamental study that gives evidence on how the arguing skills, the same discussed by Kuhn in "The skills of an argument" in 1991, can be improved by regular practice in 11 to 13 years old. There are also very precious indications on how to prepare the setting for such training."
Arguing to Learn in Science: The Role of Collaborative, Critical Discourse
Autor: Jonathan Osborne, et al.
Fonte: Science 328 , 463 (2010)
"Review article that stresses the importance of arguing in learning science. Arguing is crucial to learning because it is at the basis of the scientific process, which is presently mistaken as accumulation of revealed truths, and because it gives the opportunity to students to understand the difference between evidence, hypothesis, claims, data and reasoning. It is also suggested, and references are given, that teaching explicitly how we reason helps. I myself suggest that we should find it out for ourselves."
Making Sense of Argumentation and Explanation
Autor: Leema Kuhn Berland e Brian Reiser.
Fonte: 93(1), 26-55 (2009)
"Sense-making, articulating e persuading are 3 distincts aspects, intertwined and mutually boosting each other, that arise when you make pupils discuss."
Cognitive processes in comprehension of science texts: The role of co-activation in confronting misconceptions
Autor: Paul Van Den Broek & Panayiota Kendeou
Fonte: Appl. Cognit. Psychol. 22: 335–351 (2008)
"When new knowledge is adquired, it is interpreted through a web of concepts, automatically or deliberately activated, that include
previous knowledge and previous parts of the texts that is being read. In order for a misconception to be revised it must be activated when its correct counterpart is explained."
Explicit teaching of meta-strategic knowledge in authentic classroom situations
Autor: Anat Zohar & Adi Ben David
Fonte: Metacognition Learning (2008) 3:59–82
"This article presents a study which tests the hypothesys that explicitly teaching meta-cognitive strategies is efffective. 4 groups
are studies, in a 2X2 grid with control/experimental and high-achievement/low achievements axis, 30 students each group and
very solid statistical results (p<0.001). The meta-strategic skill explicitly teached to the experimental groups is the ability to
control variables in a study to determine which factors influences plant growth or guinea-pigs characteristics."