Legacy styles of teaching may be referred to as "sit and get," a one-size-fits-all passive learning approach. Others encourage teachers to serve as a "guide on the side" rather than a "sage on the stage," supporting more of an active learning approach for students.
Immersed in a culture of passive media consumption and screen fatigue, transitioning from long-time passive learning models to active learning outcomes has only grown more urgent for modern classrooms. The question is: What is active learning and how can educators use these strategies in their classrooms effectively?
Here, we’ll explore the definition of active learning versus passive learning, top active learning strategies, and must-know principles to use right away.
What Is Active Learning?
Chemical Engineering professor Michael Prince defines active learning as "the process of having students engage in some activity that forces them to reflect upon ideas and how they are using those ideas." Said another way, active learning is an instructional approach designed to engage learners through diverse methods rather than learning through passive modes of listening or lecture.
While intuitive, any difficulty defining active learning stems from its broad use in theory and pedagogical approaches. For example, it's used quite differently in math class than in a music theory lecture hall.
Say a group of students discuss a question written on the board. The teacher stops to listen and joins the discourse at a table where there’s confusion. The guide on the side provides clarification via live support, personalized instruction, and real time feedback.
Simply, active learning is nurturing the “light bulb moments,” where conversations, excitement, and learning momentum can continue growing at the table. Engaging learning activities move learners’ minds toward reflection, discussion, and ownership of learning, whereas passive learning has instructors at the front of the room, commonly without much student input.
- Active learning: Engages, excites, and encourages interactivity, retention, and performance. Students often teach one another in a co-operative, diverse, and collaborative environment.
- Passive learning: Relies heavily on instructors to lecture, present, or lead lessons while learners listen.
Importantly, active learning does not necessarily negate lecture. It simply amplifies the need to enhance it with video, use a dynamic delivery, and embrace engaging elements to improve outcomes.
Top Active Learning Strategies
Thankfully, advancements in education technology make implementing active learning easier than it’s ever been. Especially post-pandemic, where classrooms rapidly adapted formats from in-person to asynchronous, hybrid, and online in new ways, having the right tools in place to support active learning outcomes is crucial.
Video pedagogy provides new and engaging opportunities to boost retention and foster deep learning. Some innovative active learning methods include:
- Peer teaching
- Debates
- Roleplay
- Minute paper
- Opinion poll
- Three-step interviews
- Self-assessment
- Role playing
- Content creation (learner-made videos)
- Jigsaw
- Microlearning courses
- Concept maps
- Fishbowl
- Dotmocracy
- Round table
- Group text reading
- Case studies
Instead of using one-time active learning methods, sustainable learning outcomes require effective learning environments to deliver high-quality instruction consistently. One of the most apparent examples of active learning techniques on a large scale is the flipped classroom, where instructors use homework as class prep and class time for applying the new material.
Project-based learning (PBL) is an active learning format that encourages deep learning by combining hands-on projects with video instruction. Of course, beyond the intention to deepen learning is implementing a structure, a learning management system, and EdTech that also supports the tracking, measuring, and monitoring of this progress.
WATCH: Project-based learning for the win with WeVideo.
Extended viewing: Hear how other educators teach with video in our panel discussion, The Power of Multimedia as a Pedagogy.
Active Learning Origins
To answer the question, “What is active learning?,” it helps to understand the learning theories and theorists behind the term. Let’s explore those now.
Active learning evolved from a learning theory known as constructivism. Its tenets are offshoots from cognitive theory and launched from the minds of great thinkers like Jean Piaget, Maria Montessori, Jerome Bruner, Lev Vygotsky, and John Dewey, to name a few. Their natural inclinations gravitate toward active learning through play and exploration — what Jean Piaget termed the Sensorimotor Stage of Cognitive Development.
Maria Montessori proved constructivist philosophies effective. The Italian doctor and educator's scientific pedagogy revolved around a child's natural learning inclinations with great results and sparked a worldwide movement championing active learning principles. The contributions of these educational titans shape a world of learning in all types of environments.
Why Active Learning Matters
All of the intentional and unintentional lessons a child acquires through life experiences shape them as a learner. The prior knowledge they gain serves as a foundation for future learning opportunities. Active learning matters since it encompasses how humans are we’re wired to learn best.
In “Democracy and Education,” John Dewey answered, “What is active learning?” when he wrote,
There is no such thing as genuine knowledge and fruitful understanding except as the offspring of doing. The analysis and rearrangement of facts, which is indispensable to the growth of knowledge and power of explanation and right classification, cannot be attained purely mentally — just inside the head. Men have to do something to the things when they wish to find out something.
Core Active Learning Principles
Teachers must understand the tenets of active learning to use it effectively. These pillars are:
We Learn Based on Experience
Prior knowledge is all the lessons a person carries with them based on what they’ve learned throughout their lives. Building rapport with students and knowing them personally is a crucial component of helping young people succeed academically.
We Learn in Context
Fact and rote memorization do little for our minds. In his book, "Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World," David Epstein documents how some of the greatest thinkers solved what was once deemed unsolvable using information seemingly unrelated to the issue.
We Learn With Social Interaction
Active learning is collaborative and cooperative. When teachers turn learners into instructors using the power of video, all types of conversations and opportunities blossom.
WATCH: Video-based learning allows students to show what they know through multimedia, like in this digital citizenship project.
We Learn With Metacognition
It goes without saying, but the mind is the center of learning. Hands-on activities and working with peers are crucial to actively learning, but learning happens and expands within the mind, making metacognition — thinking about thinking — so important.
We Learn Best When Motivated
It's easier to learn when you're interested. Active learning is how the instructor sparks nurtures that interest. The better the delivery, the better the learning outcome.
We Learn Best by Doing
At Grange Hall Elementary School, students use WeVideo to make engaging morning announcements. These young people learn by doing. When they reposition lights while recording, they’re learning about shadows; audio recording teaches sound engineering. They start conceptualizing and organizing their knowledge. So, what is active learning? It’s an effective “show” more than “tell” approach.
Is Online Learning Active Learning?
If done correctly, yes. Active learning strategies exist across all settings and modalities. Take this example: Learners sign on to an online lecture, where a profession addresses his class. Instead of using the same lesson on how to write a captivating essay, he uses an active learning strategy called “think-pair-share.”
He asks the class, “What made Darth Vader turn to the dark side?”
After providing some thinking time, he pairs students to answer the question in a private chat. Here, active learning is sharing different perspectives in a peer setting. Not only does this approach engage students better, but it offsets instructor burnout from common passive learning modalities.
Does Active Learning Work in the ESL/EFL Classroom?
Yes, active learning is essential in teaching English Language Learners (ELLs) and Multilingual Learners (MLLs).
Teaching ELL requires a deep understanding of constructivism’s tenets. Without an understanding of a student’s background and prior knowledge, it’s impossible to capitalize on effective strategies like translanguaging in the classroom.
ELL teachers know the tenets of constructivism and lean on Lee Vygotsky's Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) to pair students for lessons. Vygotsky answered, “What is active learning?,” by developing markers of where individual learners are in relation to fully understanding the given information.
Active learning forms a base for teaching new concepts. Imagine teaching ELLs and MLLs at a school in Cusco, Peru.
How do you communicate the meaning of the term "Good morning" without translation — "Buenos Dias" in Spanish or "Allin punchy" in Quechua — to a class of students at the most basic levels of English proficiency?
Begin with pictures, drawings, and acting. Consider it a well-scripted game of charades between instructor and students. In this example, and generally speaking, without active learning, the lesson is lost.
Final Ways to Implement Active Learning
Here are some last-minute ways to bring active learning strategies in your learning environment.
1. Think Aloud Problem-Solving
Students verbalize their thinking while solving a problem to showcase the process. For in-person classes, this might look like demonstration via video presentations, podcasts, GIFs, or digital book reports. For online classes, this can include screen or webcam recording, or live virtual sessions.
2. Gallery Walk
Gallery walks make it easy for students to self-express while also providing and receiving peer feedback on a project. For example, learners post theories about a short story answering a question or prompt on a poster. Each learner leaves comments or questions around the room of posters to open dialogue and offer feedback. For online courses, discussion forums make it easy to create a digital gallery walk.
3. Peer Instruction
Learners received a challenge question in science class about cell division. They work together to formulate the answer before voting for the final answer. The whole class submits their votes before seeing the class’s overall results. For online courses, breakout rooms and private group chats make it easy to confer with one another before submitting to a digital poll.
Ultimately, active learning is an ongoing practice and there are endless ways to implement it. With learning outcomes as the top priority, supporting engagement, performance, and retention should be visible attempts in every lesson.
Activate Learning With WeVideo
Active learning is a direct and effective method of learning. When done correctly, it’s also arguably the most preferred by both educators and learners. Education technology has made learning management systems, video learning platforms, and innovative strategies more accessible than ever before.
Now, with video as an expected part of the curriculum, not incorporating active learning strategies can create learning gaps. That’s why interactive video and self-paced video lessons are critical for promoting outcomes (and proving them with data).
Curious how to activate learning better in your classroom? Reach out to us today to learn how WeVideo’s dynamic video learning tools create memorable experiences for all types of learners and environments.