More interactive, more engaging: teaching R in a lecture environment

R without fear: teaching strategies to make R accessible to everyone

Organised by Oxford University Statistical Consulting: Maria Christodoulou, Cora Mezger, Mariagrazia Zottoli.

Speakers:

• Sam Dumble: Learning R in a classroom or online? A natural experiment

• Nicola Rennie: More interactive, more engaging - teaching R in a lecture environment

• Jenny Terry : Overcoming Emotional and Attitudinal Barriers in the Teaching and Learning of R

• Maria Christodoulou and Mariagrazia Zottoli: Splitting the Load – Making students comfortable with R before throwing t-tests at them

More interactive, more engaging: teaching R in a lecture environment

The theoretical and practical aspects of statistics are often taught separately - with the conceptual elements of statistical models taught in lectures, and the practical exercises taught later in programming workshops. However, also bringing R into the lecture environment can help students better connect concepts with practice and motivate the use of R in students who are more reluctant to learn. In a lecture environment, instructors may include code through screenshots, running examples of code, writing code live, or through interactive apps. Some approaches are more engaging for students than others. Some approaches are easier for instructors than others.

Live coding, where instructors type and narrate code out loud as they teach with students are asked to code alongside, has been shown to improve engagement and encourage students become active participants rather than passive listeners. However, for instructors, live coding may seem to interrupt the flow of a lecture or feel daunting. In this talk, I’ll describe ways that lecture materials can be adapted to include more engaging live-coding examples, whilst minimising the pain for both students and instructors alike.

Programme: virtual.oxfordabstracts.com/#/event/6693

Registration: rss.org.uk/training-events/conference-2024/registration