Teachinglearning environments and student learning in electronic engineering

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Designing teaching-learning environments to
promote disciplinary ways of thinking
Noel Entwistle University of Edinburgh Project
web site www.ed.ac.uk/etl
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Outline of the seminar

• Key concepts and findings from previous research
• Introduction to the ETL project
• Additional concepts developed during the ETL
  project
• Analyses electronic engineering as an example
• Findings from other subjects and the project as
  whole
• Discussing ways of promoting disciplinary
  thinking

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Key concepts and findings from previous research

• Epistemological development during the degree
  course
• Conceptions of learning and their development
• Approaches to learning and studying
• Perceptions of teaching affect approaches
  vice-versa
• and teaching itself affects ways of
  studying, not just knowledge
• Teaching-learning environments acting as systems

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Approaches to learning and studying

• Deep approach in learning - seeking meaning
• Surface approach in learning - reproducing
• Strategic approach to studying - organised
  effort
• Marton, Hounsell Entwistle (1997)

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Deep approach to learning

• Intention to understand ideas and engage with
  them
• Typical learning processes - but specific to each
  subject area
• Relating ideas to previous knowledge and
  experience
• Looking for patterns and underlying principles
• Checking evidence and relating it to conclusions
• Examining logic and argument cautiously and
  critically
• Memorising whatever is essential to
  understanding
• Monitoring understanding as learning progresses
• Outcome Thoughtful accounts with evidence of
  independent identification and structuring of
  information and reasoning

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Surface approach to learning

• Intention to reproduce without much effort or
  thinking
• Typical learning processes
• Treating the course as unrelated bits of
  knowledge
• Routinely memorising facts carrying out
  procedures
• Focusing narrowly on the minimum syllabus
  demands
• Seeing little value or meaning in the course or
  tasks set
• Studying without reflecting on either purpose or
  strategy
• Outcome Descriptive, derivative accounts
  relying mainly on readily accessible sources

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Strategic approach to studying

• Intention to carry out the required work
  efficiently
• Typical study processes
• Organising studying thoughtfully
• Managing time and effort effectively
• Putting effort into the required work
• Forcing oneself to concentrate on work
• Being alert to assessment requirements and
  criteria
• Monitoring the effectiveness of ways of studying
• Outcome Depends on the balance between deep
  and surface approaches used with
  organised effort

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Students perceptions of good teaching

• Reasonable workload with some elements of choice
• Teaching clear and pitched at the students own
  level
• Steady pace in presenting new ideas
• Clear explanation based on what students know
• Staff enthusiasm for the subject being taught
• Staff interest in, and empathy with, students
• Provision of full and timely feedback on
  performance
• Fairness in assessment with grades fully
  justified
• Marton, Hounsell Entwistle (1997)

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Attribution of causality through comments

• The concepts are difficult but the lecturers
  assume we know it and so go at
• a fast pace. People cant say they dont
  understand, and yet the lecturer
• keeps on going once you get behind, you cant
  get back on terms. (Engineering)
• Recently we were doing Fourier analysis, and the
  lecturer gave an explanation,
• saying that it was like when you banged a drum
  and got lots of different sounds. He
• said If you look at it this way, you can see
  why, and he was right, you could see
• why. (Physics)
• If the tutors have enthusiasm, then they really
  fire their own students Im really
• good at and enjoy this subject, but thats only
  because the tutor has been so
• enthusiastic and now I really love it (English)
• Some staff have a lack of empathy about
  students relative knowledge levels, so
• you cant attach anything that youve been told
  to something that you know already,
• and yet that is important in learning
  (Psychology)

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Analysing teaching-learning environments as a
web of interacting influences

• Inappropriate approaches (to learning) are
  simply induced (by teaching) just one piece in
  thejigsaw that is out of place ... may
  interfere with the relation between the learner
  and the content. Encouraging students
  consistently to adopt deep approaches and employ
  them holistically is ... difficult because ...
  all the pieces need to fit together.
• Eizenberg, 1988, p. 196-7

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A systems approach to higher education

• Constructive alignment involves choosing aims
  that demand individual understanding, ensuring
  that teaching methods encourage and support those
  aims and that assignments and assessment focus
  on, and reward, the achievement of those aims.
• The students are entrapped in this web of
  consistency, optimising the likelihood that they
  will engage in the appropriate learning
  activities, but paradoxically leaving them free
  to construct their knowledge
• Biggs (2003, p. 27)

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Introduction to the ETL projectOutline research
objectives and processes

• Work with colleagues in five subject areas to
  identify the most distinctive aspects of teaching
  and learning in their subject area
• Explore how specific teaching-learning
  environments in each subject area affect
  students approaches to studying and learning
  outcomes.
• Use this evidence to negotiate possible
  adjustments to the teaching-learning environment
  and evaluate their effectiveness
• Develop conceptual frameworks and ways of
  thinking about the effects of teaching-learning
  environments on the quality of student learning

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Diverse settings investigated

• Five contrasting subject areas involved initially
• electronic engineering, biological sciences,
  economics, history, and media studies
  (dropped later)
• 17 departments in varied university
  settings, ancient, civic, 1960s,1990s one
  college
• Working with two course teams in two course units
  in each university - early and late (mainly
  first and final years)

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Main phases in the project

• Investigate the teaching-learning environments
  used by staff in departments rated as excellent
  in TQA/QAA
• Analyse questionnaire and interview data
  collected during the first year of the
  collaboration and discuss the implications of the
  findings with the course team
• Discuss the possibility of a collaborative
  initiative designed to enhance the
  teaching-learning environment
• Implement the initiative and collect the same
  data from the following year group analyse and
  discuss with the course team the effects of the
  changes

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Main components of data

• Analyse eight reports from TQA/QAA reports of
  departments rated excellent in each subject
  area and conduct telephone interviews with staff
  in four of them
• Interview collaborating staff distribute
  questionnaires to students at the beginning
  (Learning and Studying) and the end of each
  selected course unit (Experiences of Teaching and
  Learning)
• Interview small groups of students about their
  experiences of the teaching, using a schedule
  based on the second questionnaire but encouraging
  additional aspects to be raised

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Main concepts used during the ETL project

• Ways of thinking and practising (WTP) and
  throughlines
• Teaching-learning environment (TLE)
• Perceptions of the teaching-learning environment
• Approaches to learning and studying
• Constructive alignment - congruence within the
  TLE
• Troublesome knowledge
• The inner logic of the subject and its pedagogy

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Ways of thinking and practising in the subject
(WTP)

• During most of the interviews, staff seemed to be
  more comfortable to talk about what we came to
  see as the ways of thinking and practising in the
  subject, rather than about the formally defined
  intended learning objectives
• Ways of thinking and practising in the subject
  describe the richness, depth and breadth of what
  students might learn through engagement with a
  given subject area in a specific context. This
  might include coming to terms with particular
  understandings, forms of discourse, values or
  ways of acting which are regarded as central to
  graduate-level mastery of a discipline or subject
  area
• McCune Hounsell (2005)

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Ways of thinking in economics

• More recently I've come round to the view that
  economists have
• acquired a way of looking at the world which is
  indelible, and even
• though they may not find themselves in a
  position where they can
• use their analytical techniques very
  consciously, in fact their
• whole way of treating questions is affected by
  this kind of training.
• quoted in Entwistle (1997)

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Throughlines to keep the focus on understanding

• Throughlines reflect what teachers believe is
  most important
• for the students to learn in their course
  (WTPs)
• These goals are set out clearly and revisited
  regularly during
• the course to keep the students focused on the
  understanding
• aims decided for the course (i.e. aims with
  that focus).
• Introduced as part of the Teaching for
  Understanding Framework
• developed by the Harvard Graduate School of
  Education Project Zero.
• (Wiske, 2003)

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Perceptions of course demands

• Prior knowledge required
• Pace with which new material presented
• Difficulty of the concepts and skills being
  learned
• Difficulty of the generic skills involved
• Workload required

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Perceptions of teaching-learning environment

• Overall enjoyment and interest
• Clarity and coherence in course organisation
• Teaching that encourages learning
• Set work and feedback supporting learning
• Staff enthusiasm and support
• Support from other students

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Troublesome knowledge

• Ritual knowledge - names and dates are rote
  learned
• Inert knowledge that the student does not often
  use
• Conceptually difficult knowledge
• such as complex technical knowledge or ideas
  affected by mistaken expectations derived from
  everyday experience
• Alien knowledge such as presentism in history
• Tacit knowledge - acted on but not conscious of.
• Perkins (in press)

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Threshold conceptsin economics

• A threshold concept can be considered as akin
  to a portal,
• opening up a new and previously inaccessible
  way of thinking
• about something. It represents a transformed
  way of
• understanding or viewing something without
  which the learner
• cannot progress.
• For example, if opportunity cost is
  accepted by students as a
• valid way of interpreting the world, it
  fundamentally changes their
• way of thinking about their own choices, as
  well as serving as a
• tool to interpret the choices made by others.
• Meyer Land (2003)

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Strategy for integrating findings

• Establish the main type of ways of thinking and
  practising being encouraged in the course units
• Analyse questionnaires and interviews to
  establish the extent to which students saw the
  teaching-learning environment as supporting their
  learning effectively
• Discuss findings with staff and discuss
  possibilities for a collaborative initiative
• Evaluate the perceived effects of the initiatives
  to explore effective pedagogy within the subject
  area
• A summary of the overall project findings can be
  found in our Final Report to the ESRC, while more
  detailed descriptions are in our four Subject
  Area Reports. All these are available on the
  project website.

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Changes in approaches to studying Percentage
agreement with items before and during units

• Course unit A (94) B
  (68) C (54)
• I usually set out to understand Before 95.6
  87.5 81.2
• During 72.1 82.5 75.0
• Trouble making sense of things Before 25.0
  40.0 43.7
• During 61.8 55.0
  34.4
• Generally put a lot of effort in Before 60.3
  77.5 53.1
• 
  During 51.5 60.0 40.6
• Systematic and organised study Before 65.9
  62.5 46.9
  During 44.1 47.5 50.0

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Experiences of teaching Percentage agreement
with items on the same three units

• Course unit A (94) B (68)
  C (54)
• Easy pace in lectures 25.3 46.9
  72.5
• Amount of work required easy 33.3 34.7
  52.5
• Teaching fitted in with learning 72.0 67.3
  97.5
• Most of material was interesting 45.3 34.7
  82.5
• Plenty of examples provided 66.7 51.0
  95.0
• Staff were patient in explaining 81.3 81.6
  92.5
• Feedback given made things clearer 63.7 30.6
  47.5

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Effects of pace and lack of variation

• At the beginning I was all at sea, sort of too
  much information at
• one time. I just think that were given too many
  different concepts at
• one time It seemed that once wed gone over one
  specific
• network we werent given enough time to absorb
  the information
• before we were given another one, and the
  difficulty level increased
• as you went onwards.
• Youre repeatedly reading it, hearing it, talking
  about it,
• doing it, doing it, doing it and that doesnt
  work for me. For first,
• second and part of third year, it was a case of
  scraping by. Ive
• tried to go through the motions its the
  sameness. Each day is that
• pattern.

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Delayed understandingTerm introduced by Scheja,
in press

• In second year I got a better understanding of
  what I learnt in first
• year. Now in third year Ive kind of learnt what
  I was supposed to
• know in second year. Its a shame that Ive
  never felt that Ive learned
• it in the actual year it was taught
• When youre being taught something, youre just
  desperately trying to
• learn it, and theres not necessarily a whole
  lot of interest. Youre
• scrambling back to notes in preparing for the
  exams, trying to
• understand the course. And at some point during
  the learning
• process, you do get interested and then things
  start to fall into place

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Reaction to the lack of understanding

• You have to focus your energy where its
  rewarded You work
• through the problems and for the analogue ones,
  you dont get
• any answers out of them.
• You cant see how in the world you got from
  point a to point b.
• I tended to work blindly. I knew if I just
  followed these steps, then
• I could get an answer, but have no idea what to
  do and yet we
• scrape by.
• We probably would have got great marks had we
  actually
• understood what we were doing.

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Collaborative initiatives in analogue

• Increase students focus on understanding by
  encouraging them to reflect on their
  problem-solving processes while working on
  tutorial problems
• Problem-solving in electronics stressed and
  modelled during lectures examples classes
• Students encouraged to use a tutorial workbook to
  record and comment on solutions
• Arrangements made to facilitate systematic group
  discussion during tutorials

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Helpfulness of teaching-learning activities
in three units involved in the collaborative
initiative

• Mean ratings on 1 -7 scale Unit A
  Unit B Unit C
• (N 59) (73)
  (27)
• The way diagrams presented 5.0
  5.3 5.9
• The way ideas explained in lectures 4.3
  5.6 5.2
• Lecture explanations of problems 4.2
  5.8 4.9
• Worked examples provided 5.0 3.6
  5.7
• Working on problems on own 5.2 4.6
  5.3
• Using the log-book 4.2 4.3 5.1
• Staff help in tutorials 5.0 4.0
  5.9
• Discussions with other students 4.8
  4.7 5.0

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Experience of using a tutorial workbook

• I think when the lecturer mentioned the
  logbook and how you can
• look back and it will be helpful - at the time
  I thought, Helpful, my
• bum! I'm just going to realise Im not going
  to be any good at all.
• But after about Week 4, we were answering
  questions in class,and
• everybody was looking through their notes and
  Adrian says to me
• Thats in your logbook and I say, Oh, so
  it is, and we worked
• everything out really well. So, thats when I
  thought a workbook
• was going to be a must then.
• I got used to writing down all the problems in
  the workbook and
• then you can sort of look back and read through
  it and understand
• what you have done At first Id just look at
  a couple of tutorial
• questions and write down what I thought. But
  now I've got like
• pages of stuff written down, so I think the
  workbook now is really
• important to my understanding.

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Remaining issues concerning students

• Other changes that students would have welcomed
  but could bit
• be implemented included
• Overcoming a perceived step-change in the
  teaching of analogue between the first and second
  years
• Introducing substantial reductions in the
  content, and more variety provided for students
  in the lectures and generally
• Avoiding time-tabling problems that left students
  in the same room and doing similar things for
  long periods
• Providing opportunities to work collaboratively
  and also to get regular and helpful feedback on
  the tutorial problems

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Ways of thinking and practising in analogue
electronics

• Appreciating the overall function of a circuit
• Recognising the crucial groups of components
• Seeing how to set about analysing different
  circuits
• Having the necessary analytic tools for
  solutions
• Developing a memory bank of contrasting examples
• Thinking intuitively in designing new circuits

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The inner logic of teaching analogue Essential
teaching-learning emphases and activities

• Circuits linked to real-life illustrations from
  industry
• Main circuit components highlighted in diagrams
• Ways of thinking about circuits exemplified
• Ways of solving tutorial problems explained
• Students work through sets of varied examples
• Worked examples provided at the appropriate time
• Progress monitored in tutorial work and tests

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Supporting student learning in analogue

• Conclusions emerging from work on electronic
  engineering
• The WTPs suggest an inner logic to the subject
  area and its
• pedagogy - certain teaching-learning emphases
  and activities
• are essential.
• But these aspects of the teaching-learning
  environment are
• currently offered in ways which may not suit
  even a majority of
• students. The detailed feedback from students
  provided
• suggestions about how all the elements might be
  enhanced.
• The general literature on teaching and learning
  in higher
• education also suggested other possibilities
  that could be
• adapted to the pedagogy of electronic
  engineering

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Overall findings from the ETL project

• Generic pedagogic principles and methods need to
  be reinterpreted in terms of the inner logic of
  the subject
• Conceptually-based feedback from students can be
  used to enhance the congruence of
  teaching-learning environments
• Emphasising WTPs (rather than intended learning
  outcomes) have advantages in broadening the
  students focus in studying
• Students are finding that a lack of detailed,
  prompt and intelligible feedback is affecting
  their learning
• In large first-year classes, problems are being
  created by a lack of uniform practices and of
  shared information among teaching staff and
  tutors

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Ways of thinking in history

• Seeing history as being socially constructed and
  contested
• Interpreting, synthesising and evaluating
  historical evidence
• Placing events and topics within broader
  historical contexts
• Alertness to interconnections among phenomena
• Being sensitive to the strangeness of the past
• Viewing events from different perspectives

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Enhancing TLEs in history

• Refining and reinforcing thematic structures of
  modules by reducing the emphasis on chronology or
  reducing the time period
• Sharing more explicitly with students and other
  staff the reasoning behind module structures and
  links with overall WTPs
• Providing students with more detailed
  discipline-specific guidance on the specific
  skills required to read documents and analyse
  evidence
• Making more materials available through virtual
  learning environments
• Modelling explicitly in lectures and tutorials
  how historians go about marshalling evidence to
  support or contest different lines of argument
• Providing supportive tutorial environments to
  provide intellectual challenge without personal
  threat

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Ways of thinking in economics

• Using theoretical abstractions to think about the
  real world
• Understanding economic concepts and models
• Using deductive and inductive reasoning to
  analyse situations
• Interpreting econometric results from statistics
  and graphs
• Interpreting empirical evidence and understanding
  the relationship between theory and data
• Developing awareness of interconnections between
  concepts in making sense of the wider picture of
  real-world economics

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Enhancing TLEs in economics

• Considering ways of coping with the diversity of
  student intakes in first- year classes
• Putting greater emphasis on conceptual aspects of
  the subject and avoiding unnecessary reliance on
  the detailed analysis of evidence
• Identifying threshold concepts, teaching them
  more intensively and ensuring that assessment
  emphasises rewards their understanding
• Providing greater variety in students
  experiences of teaching and learning and in the
  assessment procedures adopted
• Developing assessment procedures that encourage
  broader revision for exams while stressing the
  importance of problem solving
• Trying to bridge the theory-real world divide
  more effectively by using more authentic
  problem-solving

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Ways of thinking in biological sciences

• Understanding the nature of evidence and how it
  is generated
• Thinking critically about evidence and its
  interpretation
• Using visualisation where appropriate and
  thinking systematically
• Understanding relationships between findings and
  theory
• Designing and carrying out small-scale research
  studies
• Recognising that evidence is contested and
  theories provisional
• Making interconnections between topics and seeing
  them in a real-world wider context

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Enhancing TLEs in biological sciences

• Providing fuller explanations about the reasons
  behind encouraging first-year students to develop
  some of the communication skills used by
  biologists in a assignment about explaining
  concepts to lay people
• Encouraging better communication between
  lecturers and tutors on a first-year biological
  sciences course and trying to make the level of
  marking of coursework by tutors more consistent
• Helping students to adjust to the epistemological
  and technical challenges encountered by a
  step-change in learning requirements between
  second-year and final year
• Bringing in active researchers to contribute to a
  final year module so that students heard how the
  subject was progressing. Also working on actual
  data to develop research skills.

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Discussion of ways of designing TLEs to promote
disciplinary ways of thinking

• Select a particular topic area from your own
  experience.
• What are the main ways of thinking and practising
  that you would want students to acquire? A
  starting point could be thinking about what is
  involved in adopting a deep approach in that
  subject area.
• Is it possible to discern an inner logic which
  makes certain forms of teaching essential if
  students are to learn easily and effectively?
• How are these forms of teaching currently being
  provided? To what extent do these appear to be
  congruent with the WTPs?
• What aspects of knowledge prove troublesome for
  students? Could these difficulties be discussed
  more explicitly with students? Would it be
  possible to spend more time on these aspects and
  check that students have understood before moving
  on?

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Indicative references (1)

• Anderson, C. Day, K. (2005). Purposive
  environments engaging students in the values and
  practices of history. Higher Education, 49,
  319-343. ETL project looking at history
• Biggs, J. B. (2003). Teaching for Quality
  Learning at University. (2nd Ed). Buckingham
  SRHE and Open University Press. constructive
  alignment
• Eizenberg, N. (1988). Approaches to learning
  anatomy developig a programme for pre-clinical
  students. See Ramsden (1988, pp. 178-198)
• Entwistle, N. J. (1998). Improving teaching
  through research in student learning. In J. J. F.
  Forest (Ed.), University Teaching International
  Perspectives (pp. 73-112). New York Garland
  Publishing. general review of teaching and
  learning and an earlier version of the conceptual
  map
• Entwistle, N. J. McCune, V. S. (2005) The
  conceptual bases of study strategy inventories in
  higher education. Educational Psychology Review,
  16, 325-346. Review of several study strategy
  inventories
• Marton, F., Hounsell, D. J., Entwistle, N. J.
  (1997). The experience of learning implications
  for teaching and learning in higher education.
  (now available www.tla.ed.ac.uk/resources/EOL.html
  ). Approaches to and conceptions of learning,
  and economics quote

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Indicative references (2)

• McCune, V. S. Hounsell, D. J. (2005). The
  development of students ways of thinking and
  practising in three final-year biology courses.
  Higher Education, 49, 255-289. ETL project
  looking at biology
• Meyer, J. H. F. Land, R. (2005). Threshold
  concepts and troublesome knowledge
  epistemological considerations and a conceptual
  framework for teaching and learning, Higher
  Education, 49, 373-388. ETL project looking at
  economics and other areas
• Perkins, D. N. (1999). The many faces of
  constructivism. Educational Leadership, 57 (3),
  6-11.
• Perry, W. G. (1988). Different worlds in the same
  classroom. In Ramsden (1988, pp. 145-161)
  epistemological stages
• Ramsden, P. (1988). Improving learning new
  perspectives. London Kogan Page. General review
  of student learning by Ramsden, also with Marton
• Scheja, M (in press). Delayed understanding and
  staying in phase students perceptions of their
  study situation. Higher Education.
• Wiske, M. S. (Ed.) (1998). Teaching for
  understanding linking research with practice.
  San Francisco, CA Jossey-Bass.