Active learning increases student performance in science, engineering, and mathematics

225 studies comparing active learning with traditional lecturing in undergraduate STEM courses

UNDERGRADUATE science, technology, engineering and mathematics courses — outside this archive's age range (4-18).

Recorded because a founder will be handed this paper as proof that "inquiry/active learning beats lecture", and needs to know what it does and does not show. It is undergraduate only. "Active learning" as pooled here is an extremely broad category — clicker questions, think-pair- share, worksheets, tutorials, studio courses, problem-based learning — and it is defined by contrast with continuous lecturing, which is not the counterfactual in a K-12 science classroom. Most included comparisons are quasi-experimental (different sections, different terms, sometimes different instructors), and outcomes are mostly instructor-written course examinations, i.e. aligned researcher/teacher-designed measures. Nothing in it speaks to the guidance question this archive cares about, because the active-learning arms are typically heavily structured and instructor-led.

Across 158 studies of examination or concept-inventory performance, students in active learning sections outscored lecture sections by a weighted mean of 0.47 SD. Across 67 studies of failure rates, failure was 33.8% under lecturing versus 21.8% under active learning (odds ratio 1.95) — a 55% higher failure rate under lecture. Effects were consistent across STEM disciplines and class sizes, and were larger in small classes. Two things matter for reading it across to school science: the comparison condition is CONTINUOUS LECTURING, which is not how school science is taught, and the outcomes are course-aligned instructor-written tests. It is strong evidence that undergraduates should not be lectured at continuously; it is not evidence about inquiry versus explicit instruction for 4-18 year olds.

Not the relevant confound at undergraduate level; the live threats are quasi-experimental section assignment, instructor confounding, and aligned course-exam outcomes.

Widely cited and directionally consistent with subsequent undergraduate active- learning syntheses. Its most useful companion is Deslauriers et al. 2019, which shows students in active classrooms learn more but FEEL they learn less.