Down with Lecture

What was the most memorable lecture from your K-12 school experience? Don’t worry, I’ll wait.

Can’t remember? Me either.

I think many of us can make the case that lecture sucks because it is boring. Unless your teacher was an extremely skilled communicator, who was also in tune with relevant pop culture references, you likely fought sleep for hours on end each day.

But are we right? Does lecture make school suck?

What the Numbers Say

The Washington Post published an article in June of 2017 called “It puts kids to sleep — but teachers keep lecturing anyway.” Although the title says it all, this article contains a few references to studies that really help paint the picture. Lecture is not just boring, it is ineffective. A study cited in the Posts article says, “…that failure rates under traditional lecturing increase by 55 percent over the rates observed under active learning.”

If that isn’t enough, keep reading. You’ll also find that students in lecture-based classrooms are 1.5 times more likely to fail an exam in that class.

In September of 2019 the Harvard Gazzette chimed in on this lecture vs. Active learning conversation. In the piece called “Lessons in Learning,” they tested the assumptions of students before and after exposure to each type of learning. The post-survey data showed that students were much more in favor of active learning experiences.

We can go on and on and on and on pointing out study after study, flaw after flaw. We know with authority at this point that lectures are among the most ineffective teaching tools we have. So why do teachers cling to lecture?

Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop

So many of the conversations I have had about this seems to frequently end with a teacher or school leader saying something like, “You know you’re right, we should reduce the time spent lecturing.” Notice they often say “reduce” and not eliminate. There are two reasons for that.

1. Most people only have one context for school and that is whatever they experienced as a student. Because education has not changed in about 120 years most people equate lecture with teaching. Most people believe that a teacher must deliver all content knowledge and must test a student’s mastery of that content with a paper test. So the culprit is simply a limited mindset.
2. Teaching without lecture is harder. It is messy. Because of the first reason, teaching without lecture doesn’t always look like learning in most people’s eyes. In fact, it often looks like chaos.

So where do we go from here?

Up. That is where we go from here. We go up. If you’ve read this far and are ready to kick lecture out of your life keep reading. Here are a few things you can do to effectively replace lecture in your classroom.

• Embrace Project-Based Learning: PBL is not a new innovation. It is actually very old and has made sense for a long time. At its best, it can be challenging, personalized, and effective. At its worst, it can be a waste of time. Challenge yourself to create projects students can do without your instruction. Create a well-thought-out process by which students can complete steps without you as the mastery gateway either.
• Use Problem-Based Learning: Lecture is academic. It often does not impact the life of a student outside of the classroom. One of the best ways to maximize learning is to ensure that it allows students to work and learn in the real world. What I am about to advocate for is not yo mama’s problem-based learning. I believe that students should have opportunities to solve real problems that have high stakes. Their failure to complete the project with a high-quality solution or work product should come with higher stakes than a “D” or “F” on your rubric. It should hurt in some way other than the grade book to fail this task.
• Outsource Lecture to Tech: There are two ways to do this. The first is to use video lectures. This is NOT my preferred method but can still be helpful. When you lecture live, you don’t have a pause button or a double speed feature. A student has no way to reduce the pain point that is boredom. With video, you can pause, rewind, play on double speed, and take whatever breaks you need. You are not a captive audience in a video lecture. The second way to outsource your lecture to tech is very effective. Let adaptive learning software teach all of your academics. That’s right. Math, science, reading, grammar, and even history.

In order to create more valuable learning experiences, we have to be willing to cut ties with parts of school that don’t work. Lecture is one of those things. It is time to let go.

For more on this, check out episode 005 of my podcast, the School Sucks Podcast.