Lecturing has become a much maligned teaching method in recent decades. One need only perform a brief Internet search or attend a teaching conference to understand the frequency with which the lecture format is criticized in the educational field. Many educators and administrators strongly emphasize small-group learning and other interactive techniques, and educational accrediting agencies sometimes place explicit limits on the amount of class time devoted to lecturing (Gunderman, 2013; Walthausen, 2013). Matheson (2008) summarizes a variety of common criticisms of lecturing, including that it is an outdated method, that it is ineffective due to students’ limited attention spans, and that student passivity during lectures is unlikely to promote effective learning. However, Matheson also points out that claims about the relative effectiveness of various teaching techniques are often based on little evidence. It is possible that alternatives to lecturing are more effective for achieving certain learning outcomes or educating certain types of students, but research findings fail to justify a broad indictment of the lecture method.
One particular difficulty in evaluating the relative effectiveness of teaching methods is the inherent lack of experimental control possible when conducting classroom research. Perhaps the most noteworthy obstacle is the difficulty in defining exactly what lecturing means. The term “lecture” may call to mind ideas about a person standing at a podium reading from a written speech, rather than a teacher who is dynamic, engaging, and interactive. Although many instructors work from a lecture model, what actually happens in the classroom varies widely. It is therefore difficult to standardize procedures for research comparisons because there are so many variables to control. Burkill, Dyer, and Stone (2008) noted that people tend to envision lecturing as instructors talking to students in a unidirectional fashion, but that in fact there are many ways for lectures to be interactive. They surveyed 106 academic lecturers in the United Kingdom. Nearly all the respondents agreed that good lectures should include student discussion, and that students in lecture courses should be encouraged to participate. More than 90% of the respondents reported that they try to activate student interest, increase student motivation, and encourage student participation. Most of the instructors reported that their teaching approach – even in lecture courses – is student-centered. These findings raise questions about the assumption that lecture classes are by nature unidirectional and focused exclusively on the transmission of information. Therefore, the line between lecturing and other teaching approaches is far from clear.
Research comparing lecturing with alternative teaching methods is nothing new. Two reviews provide evidence that statements regarding the broad inferiority of lectures relative to other methods may be exaggerated. Dubin and Taveggia (1968) reviewed findings from 36 studies, published between 1924 and 1965, in which researchers compared lecture to discussion methods in terms of students’ performance on examinations. They found virtually no overall differences between the methods in terms of exam performance; students taught via lecture performed better in 51% of the comparisons, and students taught via discussion performed better in 49% of the comparisons. The authors also reported that the average difference in outcome scores between methods was not significantly different from zero – leading them to conclude that the two methods tend to produce equivalent learning outcomes. Dubin and Taveggia also compared lecture-only techniques to techniques that combined lecture with discussion. Again, they found that the average difference between the methods was not significantly different from zero.
Approximately 30 years after Dubin and Taveggia’s review, Bligh (2000) published an updated and more sophisticated analysis of experimental findings on the effectiveness of lectures relative to other methods such as discussion. Bligh reported that when the learning objective is acquisition of information, most comparisons showed no significant difference between teaching methods. When differences were observed, they were as likely to favor lectures as they were to favor alternative methods. Bligh also noted that existing published research probably represents an underestimate of how frequently data reveal no differences between methods, because studies showing no difference are less likely to be published. Bligh concluded from his review that lectures are as effective as other methods for teaching content. However, he suggested that discussion techniques may be more effective for encouraging students to think about content. He reviewed several studies showing that students tend to be more thoughtful during discussions than during lectures, and noted that it is difficult to use lectures to get students to think. Nonetheless, Bligh’s review further demonstrates that the lecture method is not universally inferior to alternative methods.
Research conducted since Bligh’s (2000) review has led to similarly mixed conclusions regarding the relative effectiveness of teaching methods. For example, Schwerdt and Wupperman (2011) examined data from nearly 9,000 students at hundreds of schools who took a national math and science exam given to many eighth grade students in the United States. The classroom teachers reported the proportion of time they spent teaching via traditional lecture versus having students work on problems. Schwerdt and Wupperman controlled for variables such as school and class size, as well as numerous teacher variables such as certification, motivation, age, and years of training. The researchers reported that students in classes with teachers who devoted more time to lecture tended to score higher on the math exam than students whose teachers emphasized actively working on problems – with or without guidance. Differences in scores on the science exam were not significant. The authors asserted that simply encouraging teachers to devote more time to active problem-solving is unlikely to increase student learning and may even detract from it.
In another recent study (Costa, van Rensburg, & Rushton, 2007), undergraduate students in medical training were randomly assigned to either 12 formal lectures or 12 discussion classes covering the same content and utilizing the same textbook. Students in the discussion condition performed slightly better than those in the lecture condition on a written exam, although the researchers emphasized that the difference was small. There were no differences between the methods when the assessed outcome was performance on an oral exam.
One contemporary technique that has been offered as an active-learning alternative to lecturing is known as problem-based learning, in which students engage in active problem-solving with instructor facilitation. In a study of problem-based learning, Beers (2005) compared the learning outcomes of students in two sections of a nursing course. Students in one course were taught specific content via lecture, and students in the other course were taught the same content via problem-based learning. There were no significant differences between the two groups of students in terms of their scores on either a pre-test or post-test of the course material. Smits and colleagues (2003) conducted a similar study, but this time physicians receiving specialized training were randomly assigned either to problem-based learning or to a lecture course. Although there was no difference in acquired content knowledge as a function of teaching method, physicians trained using problem-based learning showed slightly better performance on a measure of actual task-relevant job performance. This finding is consistent with assertions that lecturing may be as effective as alternative methods for communicating content, but that some alternative methods may be preferable for teaching applied skills (Bligh, 2000).
Yet another alternative teaching technique that has emerged in recent years is known as interteaching – which involves classroom interactions between students working in pairs. The students engage in instructor-facilitated discussions of course materials provided in advance (Saville, Zinn, Neef, Van Norman, & Ferreri, 2006). Saville and colleagues conducted two studies comparing interteaching to lecture, and found that students in the interteaching conditions performed somewhat better on content exams than students who heard lectures. Interestingly, the difference in outcome was greater in their first study in which the measure of effectiveness was scores on brief quizzes than it was in their second study in which the outcome measure was scores on more comprehensive exams. This pattern could indicate some role for measurement error in the observed differences. Since measurement error tends to decrease as the length of a test increases, the larger observed differences on the short quizzes may in part reflect imprecision in measurement.
Saville et al. (2006) provide an excellent analysis of the components of interteaching that might be responsible for its apparent effectiveness, but they also note that interteaching has many components that, thus far, have not been independently evaluated. Interestingly, one of these components is lecture. In a follow-up study (Saville, Cox, O’Brien, & Vanderveldt, 2011), Saville and colleagues investigated the role of lecture as part of interteaching – noting that lecture generally takes up about one-third of interteaching class time and specifically targets content with which students report having difficulty. The researchers compared exam scores for students taught via interteaching with or without a lecture component. Students whose interteaching experience included a lecture component scored significantly higher across all five exams than students who experienced interteaching without lecture.
In one of the most important and influential recent studies evaluating the benefits of alternatives to the lecture method, Freeman and colleagues (2014) used meta-analysis – a method for combining existing studies to reveal more reliable patterns – to integrate 398 published and unpublished studies comparing traditional lecture to a variety of active-learning strategies for teaching undergraduates in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) courses. They found that students enrolled in STEM courses in which some type of active learning was employed earned grades, on average, one-half letter grade higher than students in lecture-only courses. Moreover, students in courses with an active-learning component were much less likely to fail compared with students in lecture-only courses. The authors asserted that that their findings support the objective of “abandoning traditional lecturing in favor of active learning” (p. 8410).
Although Freeman and colleagues provide important data to inform teaching strategies, several caveats must be noted. First, the average failure rate was indeed lower in active learning than in lecture courses, but the failure rate in both types of courses was extraordinarily high – with one in five active learning and one in three lecture students failing. The apparent reduction in failure rates is impressive, but the high failure rate in both types of classes makes it unclear to what extent the students were representative of college students in general. Second, although active learning provided average benefits in classes of all sizes, the benefits decreased as class size increased. This finding is grist for arguments in favor of reducing class sizes, but represents a limitation when smaller classes are not an option. Third, the instructors participating in all studies in the analysis volunteered to teach an active-learning course, so it is likely that they valued the method. As the researchers note: “It is an open question whether student performance would increase as much if all faculty were required to implement active learning approaches” (p. 8412). Finally, Freeman and colleagues defined lecturing as a practice in which an instructor speaks continuously to students and does not encourage discussion or interact with students aside from answering an occasional question. In comparison, the active-learning studies they analyzed included a wide variety of activities – some vague and some specific, taking as little as 10% and as much as 100% of class time. The researchers reported that the available data were insufficient to determine whether some activities were more effective than others, or whether incremental increases in time spent on active-learning exercises were associated with incremental learning benefits. Moreover, the distinction between lecturing and its alternatives as represented in the reviewed studies may not reflect the way that many courses are taught. Based on the categorization of studies for the meta-analysis, it appears that a course taught by an instructor who employs a lecture format but punctuates the lectures with interactive questions and discussion would be classified as an active-learning course – likely increasing student learning beyond what is typical in a lecture environment. As noted earlier, most lecturers report that they already do this. Freeman and colleagues certainly provide evidence that active-learning exercises are likely to enhance student learning, but such activities are part of many lecture-based courses so the distinction drawn for research purposes may be blurred in practice.
The relative merits of any teaching method cannot be adequately evaluated in isolation from student preferences and individual differences. In one recent study (Venkatesh et al., 2012), researchers surveyed more than 15,000 students and more than 2,600 instructors from universities in Quebec regarding their preferences for traditional lecture methods versus interactive instructional techniques. For instructors, perceptions of effective student learning were positively associated with interactive methods and negatively associated with a lecture format. In contrast, effective lecturing was the strongest predictor of perceived course effectiveness among students. It appears therefore that instructors’ views about the merits of traditional lecture do not necessarily match up with students’ views.
Baer (2010) speculated on a possible aptitude–treatment interaction whereby students’ preferences for particular teaching methods may be a function of their ability level. Based on his review of past research, Baer suspected that the structured nature of lectures might be more beneficial for lower-performing students, whereas higher-performing students could benefit more from student-centered methods. However, he noticed that students he had observed at Yale University – virtually all of whom presumably have high ability – were much more likely to attend lectures than they were to attend discussion sessions. This pattern occurred despite the fact that attendance was taken during discussion sessions but not during lectures. Baer conducted a series of four studies of college students to investigate student preferences as a function of ability. In general, students reported liking group work better than lectures, but they believed they learned more from lectures. High-achieving students liked lectures more than low-achieving students did, and higher grade point average was associated with stronger perceptions of the superiority of lectures over group work. Baer speculated that high-ability students may not believe that group work with lower-ability students will be beneficial. He noted that his study did not assess actual learning outcomes, so it is possible that students are simply wrong about what methods are most effective. Nonetheless, students do not agree that lectures are ineffective – a finding that Baer finds especially compelling given that students’ greater enjoyment of group work would seem to bias them toward thinking group work is more effective. The preference for the lecture format among high-achieving students has emerged in other studies as well (Beers, 2005). Baer emphasizes that presumably the strongest students know something about how best to learn, so instructors should pay attention to these students’ opinions.
Some research does suggest that certain types of students may benefit more from group work than from lecture. Opdecam, Everaert, Van Keer, and Buysschaert (2014) studied nearly 300 students taking an advanced accounting class who were allowed to select either a lecture course or a team-learning course in which students prepared materials beforehand and discussed the content during class. The researchers went to great lengths to be sure the team-learning strategy included many important elements for effective group interaction based on group process research. Consistent with earlier research, lower-performing students were more likely to choose the team-learning format. The average grade point average (GPA) of those who opted for the lecture format was significantly higher than the GPA of those who chose team learning; those opting for team learning also had earned lower grades in the previously-taken introductory accounting course. By the end of the advanced course, however, team learning students’ scores on an advanced accounting exam were similar to the scores of students who had chosen the lecture class and who initially were higher achieving. It should be noted that the difference in observed effectiveness between the two methods was small. Further, it does not appear that the lecture format was detrimental to learning, but rather that the team-learning approach helped lower-performing students to catch up.
Anderson and Scott (1978) found that students with low aptitude and poor opinions of their own academic abilities showed greater academic involvement during discussion and group work than during lecture. High-achieving students showed high involvement in both class formats, but during group work spent more time off-task than they did when being taught by lecture. Accordingly, Baer (2010) advises college instructors to be cautious about making pedagogical decisions based primarily on the needs of low-performing students – noting that eliminating lectures might mean high-achieving students learn less.
It is worth noting that ability level is not the only student factor that helps predict the effectiveness of various teaching methods. Dowaliby and Schumer (1987) studied college students’ performance in an introductory psychology course as a function of trait anxiety levels. Students low in anxiety learned more in a discussion class than in a lecture class. In sharp contrast, students high in anxiety learned more in a lecture class than in a discussion class. Perhaps forcing anxious students to participate in group work actually has a negative effect on their ability to learn. Dowaliby and Schumer suggest that in regard to research on the effectiveness of various teaching methods, “Perhaps there are no ‘main effects’ to be found and significant treatment effects will be evidenced only when successful attempts are made to account for individual differences” (p. 130). In other words, there may not be a single teaching technique that is most effective regardless of student characteristics.
Most instructors, especially at the college level, do not receive formal training in effective lecturing. Instead, they tend to base their approach on their experiences as students (DeGolia, 2013). Cooper and Foy (1967) had university students and instructors rate the importance of various teacher characteristics that could enhance the effectiveness of lectures. The researchers acknowledged that students’ views may not be the best way to evaluate teaching methods, but they asserted that students’ attitudes influence the effectiveness of any strategy. Moreover, students and instructors provided quite similar rankings of the importance of various teacher characteristics. Fortunately, many of the characteristics rated as most important had to do with clear and logical presentation of content. Only further down on the list did personality characteristics, such as the lecturer having a good sense of humor, show up. This suggests that the aspects of lecture most highly valued by students can be learned by instructors, because they pertain to the quality of the presentation rather than to the personality of the lecturer.
A common criticism of the lecture method is that students’ attention spans only last between 10 and 15 minutes, and therefore students are unlikely to retain content delivered in a typical lecture (see Wilson and Korn, 2007, for a review of such criticisms). Wilson and Korn found that these claims are mostly anecdotal, that in fact there are few controlled studies of student attention span, and that a variety of empirical findings are inconsistent with the 10–15-minutes claim. Notwithstanding the limited evidence that students’ attention spans prohibit them from learning via lectures, instructors can implement classroom techniques to periodically reset students’ attention. For instance, Ruhl, Hughes, and Schloss (1987) found that a strategy as simple as using periodic two-minute pauses during lectures was correlated with increased student recall of course content and improved exam performance. It seems that a small intervention to change the pace of a class can reduce the potential effects of students’ waning attention.
Parker (1993) asserted that critics of the lecture model are actually criticizing bad lectures, and that lectures are more effective when they promote information processing. He stated that lectures are particularly appropriate when the objective is for students to increase their knowledge and comprehension of content, and especially when there is a lot of content for students to learn. Based on established information-processing research, Parker recommended several strategies to enhance student learning during lectures. For example, instructors should help students link new content with information already learned. This process is facilitated when instructors state learning objectives at the beginning of class and connect them with students’ existing knowledge. Since rehearsal facilitates the transfer of information to long-term memory, instructors should present information repeatedly in addition to linking it with past experience. Instructors can also explicitly draw students’ attention to particularly important information, thereby enhancing information processing and retention. Finally, Parker points out that sensory adaptation processes can mean that an instructors’ voice becomes less novel to students as a lecture progresses, so instructors can use brief silences, demonstrations, or questioning to reset students’ attention. Although much of this advice has not been tested specifically in classrooms, the cognitive principles upon which it is based are well established.
White (2011) questions the idea that instructors must choose between lectures and interactive approaches. He asserts that lectures can include interactive elements – between students and also between students and the instructor. Other researchers agree that it is possible to introduce active-learning techniques – even in large lecture classes (Ebert-May, Brewer, & Allred, 1997). For example, Van Dijk, Van Den Berg, and Van Keulen (2001) studied engineering students who were randomly assigned to one of three teaching conditions – each 90 minutes long and covering the same content. One condition included only traditional lecture, a second condition included lecture combined with students responding to questions via an electronic response system, and the third condition consisted of brief lectures only on key topics along with the electronic response system and peer-to-peer instruction. Van Dijk and colleagues found that, based on a test of the course content, students learned as much from lecture as from interactive methods.
Ernst and Colthorpe (2007) similarly compared students – this time in a physiology course – who were taught either with traditional lecture or an interactive lecture format that included brief activities every 10–20 minutes. Students in the interactive lecture courses performed slightly better on exams than students experiencing only traditional lecture. However, the classes taught using the two different approaches were also taught in different years, introducing the possibility that the observed differences were not the result of differences in instruction. The evidence is therefore not yet conclusive that introducing interactive components to lectures has a definitive positive effect on learning. Van Dijk and colleagues (2001) suggest that active processing of information is probably more likely when active or interactive techniques are used, but this is not always the case and traditional lecturing does not always lead to passivity or lack of critical thinking.
Instructors seeking guidance to improve their lecture skills have a host of resources available to them (e.g., Bligh, 2000; Di Leonardi, 2007; DeGolia, 2013). For example, DeGolia provides excellent step-by-step guidance for preparing and implementing lectures. She provides strategies for identifying learning objectives, identifying interesting content, understanding the audience, capturing attention and activating students’ interest, encouraging participation, establishing rapport, and establishing an effective classroom environment. Much of DeGolia’s advice is grounded in empirical research. It is not clear how many instructors seek out such resources in an effort to improve their lecture skills, but training in such skills does not appear to be the norm.
Evidence supporting the general inferiority of the lecture method relative to alternatives in terms of student learning is equivocal. Therefore, it is important to consider additional variables that might affect pedagogical decisions. One advantage of lectures is their efficiency relative to most other approaches. Lectures enable instructors to communicate information to large numbers of students simultaneously. In an ideal world, efficiency of method might not be an important consideration; however, reality has long dictated that educators consider the efficiency of their methods – especially given persistent increases in class size at many institutions (Degering & Remmers, 1939; Dubin & Taveggia, 1968; Weir, 2009; DeGolia, 2013). Bligh (2000) acknowledges that both discussion and lecture can be effective, but he advises against using discussion methods for teaching content because they are more expensive in terms of instructor time and yet are no more effective than lectures. Likewise, in discussing the merits of problem-based learning versus lecture, Beers (2005) suggests that educators choose lecture, because problem-based approaches require greater resources but have not been shown to reliably increase student learning.
Even contemporary techniques designed to introduce peer interaction into lecture courses appear to have limitations in terms of efficiency. A recent test of the interteaching method described earlier included classes consisting of only 15–16 students (Saville et al., 2011). This means that the instructor had to facilitate only seven or eight discussions during a class meeting. The practicality of this method in large classes where the instructor would have 20, 30, 40, or more dyads to manage remains an open question. Many teachers might prefer that all classes have only 10 or 15 students, but this is not the reality in contemporary education. Therefore, any potential advantage of alternatives to lecture must be weighed in terms of efficiency.
Even some ardent critics of lectures acknowledge that lectures are useful for some purposes, such as providing a broader context for course content and demonstrating how an expert evaluates that content (Talbert, 2012). Other scholars have pointed out that lectures allow teachers to inspire students by demonstrating enthusiasm for course content, and help students to understand content that is particularly difficult (Matheson, 2008; White, 2011). Lectures also provide an opportunity to challenge students’ assumptions about course content (DeGolia, 2013).
Although some educators assume that student-centered approaches are superior to lecture, Burgan (2006) expresses concern about what students actually do in classes where instructors use these methods. She questions whether advocates of student-centered learning have taught large introductory courses or courses in which many students’ main objective is getting a good grade. She also ponders how to prevent unmotivated students from taking advantage of hard-working students when the two must work together. Burgan points out that even at the college level, students are at different levels of cognitive and social development, and therefore it is unlikely that all can benefit equally from alternative teaching methods. She notes, “being clueless in a discussion class is much more embarrassing and destructive of a student’s self-confidence than struggling to understand in the anonymity of a lecture” (p. 32). Kotsko (2009) likewise questions the wisdom of subjecting students to class discussion when they do not understand the readings, and also questions the notion that most students have adequate reading skills to comprehend and evaluate material read outside classes. Saville and colleagues (2006) noted that students in the interteaching classes they studied often arrived for class unprepared for peer discussions, which could have impacted their partners’ learning. In contrast to claims from one cognitive scientist that people learn best through interaction with the environment (see MacKlem, 2006), Burgan cites a different cognitive scientist who argues that, for most disciplines, a great deal of knowledge cannot be learned in the absence of direct instruction.
Lectures have limitations like any other teaching method, so the nature of the course material may dictate the best teaching approach. Lectures may be less effective than some alternatives in helping students to improve critical thinking or communication skills (Parker, 1993), and having students learn by doing is likely to be more effective when the learning objective is acquisition of specific behavioral skills (Bligh, 2000; White, 2011). Bligh points out that lecturing is likely to be ineffective for teaching applied skills such as performing surgery or using a library, but that even these skills require students first to have background knowledge which they can acquire via lecture.
Evaluating the relative effectiveness of various teaching methods is remarkably difficult. Specific methods are often made up of a variety of techniques, there are many variables that are out of researchers’ control, and people who conduct the research often have a bias against certain techniques – especially lectures (Bligh, 2000). Given the lack of experimental control that is possible when conducting classroom research, the potential for experimenter bias should be noted. In a meta-analysis of studies of small-group learning, Springer, Stanne, and Donovan (1999) found that the observed effectiveness of the small-group method was significantly greater for studies where the researcher and instructor were the same person than they were when the study did not indicate that the researcher was directly involved in class teaching. When alternative strategies are compared with lecture, one must consider the quality of the research and the size of the effect in light of the many other variables that affect teaching decisions. Perhaps making broad claims about lecture versus other formats is ill-advised. There are simply too many variables to account for, and no method is likely to be implemented the same way across instructors.
The effectiveness of any teaching strategy is a function of both the method itself and student and instructor preferences. Weir (2009) argues that poor lecturing is likely to result when instructors do not work to refine their lectures because they do not value the method. If an instructor enjoys a particular method and believes that it is effective, he or she will try harder to make it effective. Bligh (2000) asserts that students will engage in thoughtful inquiry during lectures if they are disposed to do so, but the same could be said for any teaching method. Indeed, Burgan (2006) claims that motivated students can probably learn from any teaching method. Moreover, there are certainly high- and low-quality class discussions and group interactions, just as there are high- and low-quality lectures. While criticisms of lecture are widespread, they are far from universal. In fact, some current scholars have argued that lectures have “immense value” (Walthausen, 2013: para. 3), and that removing lectures from education would be a “grave error” (Gunderman, 2013: para. 15). All teaching methods have weaknesses, so no single method represents a perfect tool for promoting student learning. Varied learning environments, learning objectives, and learner characteristics demand varied instructional methods, and lectures are likely to remain important among these methods.