Different question formats and quality of team discussion in team-based learning

• Main Author: Nurul Anis Huda Mohd Yem
• Other Authors: Erik Anders Mikael Gustavsson
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: Nanyang Technological University 2021
• Subjects: Social sciences::Education; Science::Mathematics
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/10356/148495
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

This study investigated an under-researched area in Mathematical Education – whether the standard IF-AT question format or the split-answers (hedging) question format may have any effects on student performance and team discussion styles in a TBL class. A total of 102 students taking a Year 1 Calculus course were surveyed on their individual contributions to team discussions and to find out their perspectives on how their teams had engaged in discussion. Firstly, we found that standard format gave better team performance scores than the hedging format, but this may be attributed to the differing ways the marks are awarded for each question format. Secondly, we found that question format did not significantly affect the styles of team discussion. Thirdly, our findings showed that guessing and consensus-based discussion may negatively affect team performance; since there were only 3 TRAT sessions, the teams may not be comfortable with working with each other yet, making consensus-based discussions counterproductive. Future work should test this hypothesis. Moreover, the results in this study showed that team members’ individual performances were a positive predictor of team performance, and students’ prior knowledge of Calculus concepts played a significant role in predicting their individual performances. Lastly, it is possible that students who participated more may have realized more concepts they do not understand, making them study harder, and thus do better in the final quiz. This hypothesis should also be explored in future work. This study provides important contributions to the research of what factors make some groups better than others.