Promoting Active Learning for Increasing Students’ Understanding of the Teaching Materials: A Report on Teaching Experience in Computer Science

Abstract

Knowledge gap among students is one of the challenges in teaching-learning process. Active learning can be one way to the solution, as study shows that active learning increase students’ achievement. Knowledge transfer between peers can have its place in an active class, since group discussion is part of the class design. We have been applying active learning in our classes where students were invited to teach in small groups or in class. This study aims at collecting feedbacks from students whether the class designs give positive impacts to students’ understandings of the teaching material. Thirty-six students fill out the questionnaire in Google Form anonymously about the activities in our class settings in the past semester. The result shows that active learning increases students’ understanding of the teaching materials. Active learning motivates students to study and to share knowledge with peers in small groups as we have bonus points for individual and for group. We conclude that our class design that promotes active learning can bridge the knowledge gap between students.