Morgan State University, Baltimore, Maryland
April 7, 2017
April 7, 2017
April 8, 2017
Diversity
6
10.18260/1-2--29261
https://peer.asee.org/29261
239
Dr. Vasudeva Rao Aravind is an associate professor of physics at Clarion University. Dr. Aravind has a Ph.D from The Pennsylvania State University in Materials Science and Engineering and Master’s and Bachelor’s degrees in Physics from Sri Sathya Sai Institute of Higher Learning, India. Dr. Aravind is a highly accomplished scholar and researcher in the fields of materials science, condensed matter physics, materials for energy applications, and educational technology. He has published his work in more than 15 prestigious journal articles and presented numerous invited talks and conference presentations throughout the world. His current research involves nanoscale structure property exploration through microscopy, and effective use of educational technology in the undergraduate physics classroom.
Improving student education in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) is critical to the progress and success of an economy. Although it is well established that STEM related degree holders are likely to be more successful and earn a higher income that non-STEM degree holders, the number of students opting to study STEM courses do not show a significant growth. There are several reasons for this. One of the main reason is the rate of attrition in basic and required STEM classes such as physics and calculus. In this article, we describe our attempt at improving physics learning using a responsive computer based tutor. This automated tutor presents problems to students, takes their input, and provides immediate feedback and/or hints to the student based on their input. While it is interacting with the students, the computer collects anonymous student data at a very fine grained level, recording every mouse click, student response, and waiting times. Studying about 2000 such student interactions, we present the lessons learned, patterns of student behavior recognized, and suggestions for future deployment.
Aravind, V. R., & Croyle, K. D. (2017, April), Individualized Learning through Computer Based Tutors Paper presented at 2017 ASEE Mid Atlantic Section Spring Conference, Morgan State University, Baltimore, Maryland. 10.18260/1-2--29261
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