Active Learning Classrooms

Active Learning Classrooms Technology, Educational and Design Features Programmatic considerations for the Health Kinesiology Building at Texas A&M

February, 2013

Active Learning Classrooms Overview

University of Minnesota as with other universities around the country have enacted the use of Active Learning Classrooms (ALCs). These ALC’s are designed to foster interactive, flexible, student-centered learning experiences, and operate using central teaching stations, team tables, digital media and lap tops. The University of Minnesota ALC, is a modification of the “SCALE-UP” (Student Centered Active Learning Environment with Upside-down Pedagogues) concept that originated at North Carolina State University and the TEAL (Technology Enhanced Active Learning) concept at MIT, and uses an adaptation of the Projection Capable Classrooms (PCC) technology system.

An Active learning classroom (ALC) is implemented to enhance the learning experience in a classroom setting that is interactive, small-group structured, instructional and project-based learning. Through research and application of these ACL’s, three features are critical to their success in their implementation and outcome. Those features are comprised of technology enhanced learning, learning that employs small-group teams within the educational process, and design that provides the learning environment with the spatial qualities required of an ACL classroom.

Technology Features

Direct access to media, information and computational technology provides the foundation for the enhanced learning features of the ALC. Multiple flat panel displays and marker boards are mounted on the classroom wall on all sides. A large projection screen, large enough from viewing from all locations in the room, is placed at a strategic location in the classroom. Round tables that accommodate nine students each are provided access portals to power/data/microphone. An instructor’s hub station is centrally located, the station allows the instructor control of selection and display of information and delivery.

Educational Features

Cooperative learning environments encourage student collaboration and peer teaching. The incorporation of media, informational and computational technology into the learning space gives students opportunities to present their work for team, peer and instructor review. Furniture groupings enhance the small-group work and team-based interaction. The room is designed that all wall surfaces are equipped with display and interactive technology. In the arrangement of the room, the instructor is freed from the confines of a teaching wall and allowed to move freely throughout the space to provide direct coaching.

ALC’s provide each student the ability to directly contribute to the team within the team-based setting.

Design Features

Fourteen ALCs at the University of Minnesota are available in the Science Teaching & Student Services Building, and are available for anyone to request during open scheduling. These classrooms accommodate class sizes between 27 (780 SF) to 126 individuals (2,890 SF). The larger classrooms for 90 and 126 students are designed to subdivide based on semester-to-semester demand. Square footage per student in the ALC classrooms range from 18.5 SF to 29 SF per student, with a mean average of 27 SF per student.

Team tables are distributed equally throughout the room, with open space in the center of the room that allows ease of movement for instructor and students to visit each of the tables located around the room.

Tables are placed around the perimeter to provide each team with close visibility to adjacent monitor displays and marker boards mounted along the perimeter. To enhance digital display, the lighting is indirect from both daylight and artificial lighting sources to minimizing glare and optimize color and contrast.

Other forms of considerations are given for optimum acoustical, ergonomic and environmental controls.

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Active Learning Classrooms

Design Feature Prototype University of Minnesota - STSS Building

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Prototypical ALC Features 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

Large operable projection screen Ceiling mounted digital LCD projection device Flat panel screen White or glass marker board High NRC suspended acoutical ceiling Direct/Indirect lighting Diffused daylight Displacement ventilation Raised floor for flexible data/power access. Wireless access throughout Round table seating for 9 students, central power/cable podium Mobile seating Acoustical panels and sound seperation wall to deck Page 2

Active Learning Classrooms Design Feature - Team Tables University of Minnesota - STSS

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Team Table Features 1 2 3 4 5

7’-0” diameter at 29” height.

(3) microphones, (1) per team.

Raised center triangle for accomodating power/data/cable access ports Power/Cable access ports (3) laptops, (1) per team

The round team tables are one of the defining characteristics of the active learning environment. Each team table is designed an optimal size of 7-foot diameter in order to accommodate 9 students, which can then be subdivided into three teams of three students. Students use mobile seating for comfort and ease of collaborative interaction.

“The ideal size was found after experimentation with half a dozen table geometries. The 7-foot diameter permits table-wide conversations while being both large enough to avoid crowding and small enough for efficient use of space. Tables that are too large actually discourage table-wide discussions” (Professor Robert Beichner, NCSU, Department of Physics, 2006).

Each of the three teams are equipped with a laptop, with each team sharing one laptop. Lap tops are lower in height and smaller in footprint than conventional PC’s, there by they allow clear visual connection between students and instructor and more table surface available. Lap tops remain in place during class period with wireless access available throughout the classroom.

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Active Learning Classroom 1 27 Seats - 780 SF University of Minnesota - STSS

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Floor Plan

Classroom Features 1 2 3 4 5 6

Instructor Station Operable projection screen Team tables Storage Video Monitor Technology Racks

Air Conditioning Campus Telephone Closed Captioning DVD Player Data/Video Projection Digital Door Signage Document Camera East Bank Instructor Microphone Markerboard Projection Capable Classroom Tables and Chairs Wireless access VCR Video Monitor (3) Wired Network Jack Page 4

Active Learning Classroom 1 27 Seats - 780 SF University of Minnesota - STSS

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Active Learning Classroom 2 45 Seats - 1,100 SF University of Minnesota - STSS

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Floor Plan

Classroom Features 1 2 3 4 5 6

Instructor Station Operable projection screen Team tables Storage Video Monitor Technology Racks

Air Conditioning Campus Telephone Closed Captioning DVD Player Data/Video Projection Digital Door Signage Document Camera East Bank Instructor Microphone Markerboard Projection Capable Classroom Tables and Chairs Wireless access VCR Video Monitor (5) Wired Network Jack Page 6

Active Learning Classroom 2 45 Seats - 1,100 SF University of Minnesota - STSS

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Active Learning Classroom 3 54 Seats - 1,430 SF University of Minnesota - STSS

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Floor Plan

Classroom Features 1 2 3 4 5 6

Instructor Station Operable projection screen Team tables Storage Video Monitor Technology Racks

Air Conditioning (Central) Campus Telephone Closed Captioning DVD Player Data/Video Projection Digital Door Signage Document Camera East Bank Instructor Microphone Markerboard Projection Capable Classroom Tables and Chairs Wireless access VCR Video Monitor (7) Wired Network Jack Page 8

Active Learning Classroom 3 54 Seats -1,430 SF University of Minnesota - STSS

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Active Learning Classroom 4 63 Seats - 1,170 SF University of Minnesota - STSS

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Floor Plan

Classroom Features 1 2 3 4 5 6

Instructor Station Operable projection screen Team tables Storage Video Monitor Technology Racks

Air Conditioning Campus Telephone Closed Captioning DVD Player Data/Video Projection Digital Door Signage Document Camera East Bank Instructor Microphone Markerboard Projection Capable Classroom Tables and Chairs Wireless access VCR Video Monitor (6) Wired Network Jack Page 10

Active Learning Classroom 5 63 Seats - 1,170 SF University of Minnesota - STSS

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Active Learning Classroom 5 90 Seats - 1,890 SF University of Minnesota - STSS

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Floor Plan

Classroom Features 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

Instructor Station Operable projection screen Team tables Storage Video Monitor Technology Racks Operable Wall

Air Conditioning Campus Telephone Closed Captioning DVD Player Data/Video Projection Digital Door Signage Document Camera East Bank Instructor Microphone Markerboard Projection Capable Classroom Tables and Chairs Wireless access VCR Video Monitor (10) Wired Network Jack Page 12

Active Learning Classroom 5 90 Seats - 1,890 SF University of Minnesota - STSS

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Active Learning Classroom 6 126 Seats - 2,900 SF University of Minnesota - STSS

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Floor Plan 6

Classroom Features 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

Instructor Station Operable projection screen Team tables Storage Video Monitor Technology Racks Operable Wall

Air Conditioning Campus Telephone Closed Captioning DVD Player Data/Video Projection Digital Door Signage Document Camera East Bank Instructor Microphone Markerboard Projection Capable Classroom Tables and Chairs Wireless access VCR Video Monitor (14) Wired Network Jack Page 14

Active Learning Classroom 6 126 Seats - 2,900 SF University of Minnesota - STSS

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Endnotes Aimee Whiteside, Linda Jorn, Ann Hill Duin, and Steve Fitzgerald, “Using the PAIR-up Model to Evaluate Active Learning Spaces, EDUCAUSE Quarterly, vol. 32, no. 1.

Aimee L. Whiteside, D. Christopher Brooks, and J.D. Walker, “Making the Case for Space: Three Years of Empirical Research on Learning Environments,” Whiteside, Brooks, Walker EQ Manuscript, Summer 2010.

Aimee Whiteside and Steve Fitzgerald, “Designing Learning Spaces for Active Learning,” Implications, vol. 7, pp. 1–6.

Linda Jorn, Aimee Whiteside, and Ann Hill Duin, “PAIR-up,” EDUCAUSE Review, vol. 44, no. 2 (March/April 2009).

Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Educational Transformation through Technology at MIT, TEAL Technology-Enhanced Active Learning, Web. Todd, Jeremy, Director of Classroom Management, University of Minnesota, Telephone Interview, 2010.

University of Minnesota, Office of Classroom Management, Office of Undergraduate Education, “Active Learning Classrooms (ALC),” Web.

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