Research on a Lecture-Tutorial Approach to Teaching Introductory Astronomy for Non–Science Majors

TLDR

The Lecture‑Tutorials are collaborative, learner‑centered activities that fit into conventional introductory astronomy courses without extra equipment or major revisions, each 15‑minute session presenting Socratic, concept‑challenging questions with graphs and data tables to promote critical reasoning. The project developed materials grounded in research on student misconceptions and employed proven instructional strategies, while also assessing changes in conceptual understanding and attitudes through quantitative and qualitative pre‑ and post‑course measures. The project produced 29 learner‑centered materials for large‑enrollment introductory astronomy courses for non‑science majors, and field‑tested them across diverse institutions, demonstrating effectiveness.

Abstract

The Lecture-Tutorial curriculum development project produced a set of 29 learner-centered classroom instructional materials for a large- enrollment introductory astronomy survey course for non-science majors. The Lecture-Tutorials are instructional materials intended for use by collaborative student learning groups, and are designed to be integrated into existing courses with conventional lectures. These instructional materials offer classroom-ready learner-centered activities that do not require any outside equipment or drastic course revision for implementation. Each 15-minute Lecture-Tutorial poses a sequence of conceptually challenging, Socratic dialogue-driven questions, along with graphs and data tables, all designed to encourage students to reason critically about difficult concepts in astronomy. The materials are based on research into student beliefs and reasoning difficulties, and use proven instructional strategies. The Lecture-Tutorials have been field- tested for effectiveness at various institutions, which represent a wide range of student populations and instructional settings. In addition to materials development, a second effort of this project focused on the assessment of changes in students’ conceptual understanding and attitudes toward learning astronomy as a result of both lecture and the subsequent use of Lecture-Tutorials. Quantitative and qualitative assessments were completed using a precourse,