2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

In this paper I will provide a first-person account of the evolution of my approach to teaching Statics, culminating in a recent fundamental change (Fall 2022) to teach statics in a “studio style” format versus a conventional classroom format. My account will provide both qualitative and quantitative data to provide insight and comparative analysis to other approaches.

My first decade of teaching (beginning Spring 2001) was characterized primarily by direct lecturing, with some active elements through student projects, presentations, and guided activities in recitations. In roughly my second decade (beginning Fall 2009) I made a fundamental change to use the inverted classroom format, later coupled with concept learning some years later. At the beginning of my third decade (Fall 2020) I made another fundamental shift, when I adopted Mastery Based Learning (still coupled with inverted and concept-based instruction, but with a competency based grading standard instead of a traditional average grade standard).

Throughout this trajectory, there were several constants: good overall teaching evaluations and comments from students that I am enthusiastic, give them attention, value their learning, and demand excellence; criticisms were that the workload and expectations were high. Another constant during this time was that exams were weighted to be at least 65% of the course grade, and team or other exploratory projects were never weighed more than 10%. The ultimate constant was a relatively stable grade distribution with approximately 50% of students earning A, B, or C. My informal goal of 65% of the students earning at least C proved elusive, despite the several significant changes in approach that I have made.

During a conversation about this, a colleague asked me if it would be possible to teach a class without exams. Intrigued and perhaps intimidated, I was inspired develop a “studio-style” class, characterized by two key aspects: (1) Organize the class in teams to explore statics through measurement, sketching, physical models, and observation, with class time used for coaching and consultation; (2) Balance the grading so that 50% is based on the team activities, and 50% is based on tests.

Although the class still retains the use of exams, the new weighting is designed to substantially reward non-exam experiences, including making observations that might not be exactly “correct”. To structure teamwork – and understanding of what teamwork is – the CATME system is used for peer evaluation. I hypothesized that the combination of shifting student responsibilities to be partly accountable to other student teammates, together with a new setting that opens up new learning pathways that were not part of my previous practice (drawing, measurement, observation, etc.), would lead to learning gains.

To evaluate the studio approach, I decided to use the same mastery tests and concept questions as in previous two years. I also have qualitive data from the CATME Peer Evaluation platform, supplemented by my own observations of classroom atmosphere and student behavior. As of the writing of this abstract, with the semester still in progress, final results are not available. However early indications suggest that student performance on the equivalent mastery tests is modestly better than in the initial implementation of Mastery Based Learning, and that there is tangible added value ranging from improved work ethic to being more precise with measurements and calculations.