2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

In this work-in-progress study, we investigate how instructors in a sophomore level mechanics class use formative assessment during an in-class small-group discussion activity. We characterize both professor and learning assistants (LAs) moves as they work with the student groups.
The LA model for peer instructors emerged from physics and biology education but has recently been gaining momentum in engineering departments. LAs are undergraduate students who facilitate student thinking and encourage inclusive active learning in the classroom. They participate in weekly preparation sessions with their supervising faculty, where they provide input as active members of the instructional team for their course. A key distinction between LAs and TAs is that LAs participate in a pedagogical training program and typically do not partake in the grading process. This creates opportunities for students to express confusions and ideas without fear of negative impact on their course grade. Research is needed to explore the types of moves that LAs use to enable these discussions of ideas.
This study looks specifically at the instructors of an introductory level mechanics course at a small private university in the northeastern US. For the particular class session at the focus of this study, the students had been assigned for homework an open ended modeling problem focused on a weight-bearing structure. During the class session, the students met in small groups to compare their individual solutions and work together to make a group model of the structure. LAs and the professor visited the groups as they worked.
We look to Dini et al.’s formative assessment enactment model (FAEM) to characterize the range of instructional moves used. The FAEM looks at how instructors advance, interpret, and elicit student thinking as well as how authoritative and dialogic they are with these moves. The central question for this study is: What instructional moves are mechanical engineering learning assistants and professors using when they interact with students working in small groups in an engineering science class?
We collected audio recordings from 12 groups across two sections of the course for the 75-minute class session. Groups were between 3 and 4 students. The professor and LAs circled around the room to check in on progress, converse with groups, and respond to questions. Analysis of the transcripts from these class sessions is ongoing, but preliminary findings distinguish three different patterns of discourse of the three different instructors. The professor used more authoritative moves than either of the learning assistants, specifically authoritative eliciting and advancing. One of the learning assistants was particularly dialogic in their discourse and specifically used dialogic eliciting and interpreting moves the most. They were also the most frequent user of dialogic advancing, however this was the lowest category used overall. The final learning assistant seemed to be a blend of the other two instructors but used authoritative interpreting and advancing moves the most frequently. In the full paper, we will characterize the range of moves that the instructional team used and compare them with each other.