RUME 14 (Volume 2)
2011
Portland, Oregon
PROMOTING SUCCESS IN COLLEGE ALGEBRA BY USING WORKED EXAMPLES IN WEEKLY ACTIVE GROUP SESSIONS
Page: 268
At a research university near the east coast, researchers have restructured a College Algebra course by formatting the course into two large lectures a week, an active recitation size laboratory class once a week, and an extra day devoted to active group work called Supplemental Practice (SP). SP was added as an extra day of class where the SP leader has students to work in groups on a worksheet of examples and problems, based off of worked example research, that were covered in the previous week’s class material. Two sections of the course were randomly chosen to be the experimental group and the other section was the control group. The experimental group was given the SP worksheets and the control group was given a question and answer session. The experimental group significantly outperformed the control on a variety of components in the course, particularly when prior knowledge is factored in.