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And those of us from under-powered backgrounds
have been taught in various ways precisely not to do
what people from over-privileged backgrounds do.
So Traisman said, if we don't like what's happening,
we're going to have to take control of the social system.
You see what assessment does to your brain?
Do you like what scholarship, teaching, and learning does
to your brain?
The first thing you know, you start talking about a math class
as a social system and about the professor as needing
to take control of it.
You can tell that's crazy crap, right?
So he invited the students within the expected
60% D-F-W rate in the special honors discussion sections.
It turns out with us under-powered students,
one of the key things is to say we know you can do it...we've
got confidence in you.
It's hard, you didn't come to college to coast, but you
can do it.
And then he organized various systems,
including peer checking, to get them to work together outside
of class and inside of class.
And then, just in case there was a social element,
he organized a few softball games between sections.
The D-F-W rate went from 60% to 4%.
There were no differences in ability, preparation,
motivation, social shock, or anything else that were not
so entirely eliminated by responsible pedagogy.
But what the average grades for African-Americans became higher,
but not significantly higher, than the average grades for the
previously highest achieving, identifiable Asian-Americans.
No differences, again, in ability, preparation,
motivation, social shock, time available.
Now notice, I wasn't as well prepared for calculus.
In some of the other students from under-powered backgrounds,
there are differences in preparation, but they're made
irrelevant when you take effective control of the system.
Notice I didn't say there weren't any differences,
necessarily, in ability or motivation or preparation.
What I said was, any differences that there might have been
were made irrelevant.
And this has been repeated in scores of other institutions
in a variety of disciplines.
We tried a week version in molecular biology at IU.
And the professor, before he announced the results,
circulated his exams to everybody who had taught
the course before, had them rate the exams as a lot easier,
a little easier, a little harder, or a lot harder
than the exams used before.
And the other faculty said, your exams are a little harder.
And he said, well that's really good because the grades are
one grade, full grade, higher this year...one full grade jump
in a single semester...for the whole class, by using
effective pedagogy.
Most low grades in college and university are the result
of irresponsible pedagogy, rather than broken students.
Not all, but most.
In the case of Traisman and Berkeley, 14 out of 15 students
were fixed by a simple change in the pedagogy, 14 out of 15
that they thought were broken.
Fourteen out of the 60%, out of every 15 in the 60%
were fixed by responsible pedagogy, with no change
in the standards of the course, as shown by the grades
of the other students taking the same exam, and with an increase
in the success of African-Americans in all
subsequent math and science courses.
We have an ethical dilemna in higher education because we
don't pay any attention to what's known about how to teach.
Introduction one, pedagogy really matters.
Introduction two, critical thinking.
Think about the course where you'd most like to produce
critical thinking, and sketch for me what it would be,
what the students could do if they could think critically.
For the course where you'd most like critical thinking,
sketch what the students could do if you had been successful.
Pen to paper, obviously.
[no dialogue].
And when you're ready, stand up, and with at least one new person
in groups of two or three, compare what you have.
[general audience chatter].
Alright, the noise level is beginning to die down,
let's see if we're ready.
And let's see, would you give me something your group had,
any one thing.
(female speaker). Well, I wasn't in a group,
I was just kind of writing for the paper,
so I was trying to write down ideas.
[audience laughter].
(Dr. Nelson). What was one of the ideas
you wrote down?
(female speaker). Take what you've learned
from the basics and kind of expand on it.
I think Bud Fischer said he thought of his as kind
of a circle, like, take everything and kind of
connect it and expand on it.
(Dr. Nelson). So connect and expand.
Good recovery there.
[audience laughter].
And how about you, ma'am?
Something from your group, or from yourself.
(female speaker). Applying the concepts
to real problems.
(Dr. Nelson). Usually problems outside
the course, real problems in that sense, right?
How about you, sir?
(male speaker). Being able to take
quantitative data to help make a decision in business.
(Dr. Nelson). Use quanitative data
for decision and, of course, the "quantitative" part may
vary by discipline, but the "apply data to decisions"
is a really general process, right?
Sometimes we want quantitative, qualitative, sometimes both.
You, ma'am?
(female speaker). When presented with
an ethical problem, not based on their emotions
or what they've been brought up [unclear audio] look at
both sides and step through logically [unclear audio].