Though the average classroom size at Iowa State is 33 students, many undergraduates end up in lectures with hundreds of students when finishing prerequisite and general education classes.

These larger classes could be challenging for professors.

Assistant Professor of English Michael Brown has poured through the data and may have developed effective technology to help educators.

His research is directed at large classroom sizes, and he studies student study habits and integration with technology in order to develop methods of improving academic success.

“What we observed is that students would meet in groups and then use technology as part of their study group time,” Brown said. “Students who worked in these groups tended to do better than those who didn’t, whether they used the technology or not.”

Brown explained that when it comes to large lectures, supplemental instruction and study groups can be beneficial for solidifying information.

They also have been doing a study using a program similar to Canvas, in which the program sends students “nudges” for recommendations in study habits, as well as analytics prior to exams to help students prepare for their tests.

“Especially for freshmen,” Brown said.”There’s learning, and there’s learning how to learn in a college classroom, which is so different from a high school classroom– especially in these large lectures. Part of what we want to do is not just telling students what material they need to know but helping them find the best way to learn the material.”

The research also found study groups to be beneficial. These study groups changed over time.

At the start of the course, students connected in larger study groups, with typically one high intensity reviewer and many less intense reviewers. The groups are pictured in the map below.

However, further into the course, these groups condensed from larger groups to smaller groups, as well as more segregated. The study groups observed at the second point in the course were small and more separated by frequency and intensity of their studying.

Brown said part of their goal is to help students manage their time by making their studying work for them. He said all of the activities in a student’s life on top of classes and jobs can be a lot, and their hope is to help students use the time they do have for studying more effectively.

“What I would love to do [at Iowa State] is find instructors that want to address these issues in their classroom,” Brown said. “The nudging approach is designed for Canvas, which we will be using in the fall, so this can be a good way to get students engaged in their coursework.”

If you are an instructor interested in implementing this technology, contact Michael Bown here.