A teaching activity used by ESHCC lecturer Julian Schaap in which he gets students to apply theories to real-life situations.
In many courses, students learn theories or perspectives to explain phenomena. However, it is always difficult to apply these theories in practical situations. In the Apply-a-theory quiz, the lecturer uses video fragments of real-life situations to which students can apply these perspectives.
- Activity goal
- Assess | Exchange knowledge | Reflect
- When
- In class
- Where
- Offline | Online
- Duration
- < 30 minutes
- Group size
- Small | Medium | Large
- Materials
Zoom, MS Teams, Mentimeter, Feedback Fruits
Step-by-step
Step 1
Find video fragments (on YouTube, for example) of real-life situations in which the perspectives you have addressed in your lecture can be applied.
Step 2
Show the videos to the students in the plenary session.
Step 3
Ask the students which theory they would apply to explain the situation in the video. Use the polling option in Zoom for this or create a multiple-choice question in Mentimeter
Step 4
Show the students' answers and discuss them. Ask the students why they chose a certain theory, and how they would apply it.
This teaching method was added to teachEUR by ESHCC lecturer Julian Schaap. The students in Julian Schaap's class were very enthusiastic about this teaching method. Despite the size of the group (>50), students were keen to say what they thought and why they had doubts. The real-life application of theories brought them to life, giving the students more confidence to use theories to understand everyday life - a key objective of the course. Would you like more information from the lecturer who added this teaching method, contact Julian Schaap.
Variation
Instead of playing the videos in class, you can ask the students to watch them beforehand. Use the Feedbackfruits tool Interactive Video to add multiple-choice questions to the video and thus ask the students which theory they would apply to the situation in the video. You can also add a discussion to the video in which students can explain how they would apply the theory in the video. In class, you can then discuss the students' answers in more detail.
Example
After watching this video students had to indicate whether this could be understood from one of these three different ways of understanding how consumers approach cultural products:
1. The uses and gratifications theory;
2. The encoding/decoding theory;
3. The reception theory.
In this case, the last two theories proved the most popular to use.
Use MS Teams of Zoom for an online or hybrid meeting and Mentimeter to instantly share students' answers. Alternatively you could use the interactive video tool in Feedbackfruits to ask questions about a video and open a discussion about it.
Consider the tools and materials mentioned here as suggestions. In many cases it’s possible to use alternative tools. Please turn to the Learning & Innovation team of your faculty first to see which online and offline tools are available and how to apply them.
