Critical Thinking, Knowledge Retention and Strife: Reflections on Active-learning Techniques

Common practice in delivering introductory GIS involves students sitting down with a computer and “doing GIS”. Methods of implementing these laboratory exercises vary widely from cookbooklike recipes for GIS (or task) success to unscripted exploratory free-for-alls where students are often left to sink or swim on their own. Somewhere in between is the golden path to GIS enlightenment. Based on past and current experiences in the classroom we hope to elucidate some rules of thumb for successful active learning exercises and more importantly to bring to light clear pitfalls associated with these instructional techniques. In addition to laboratory exercises, possibilities for increasing active content in lectures will also be discussed. Our evaluation rubric will focus on the ability of each technique to stimulate critical thinking and lead to increased knowledge retention taking into consideration cognitive load and time management constraints of actively engaging students in complex problem-solving activities.