The Relationship Between Attendance in Student‐centred Physics Tutorials and Performance in University Examinations

Abstract

The School of Physics at the University of Sydney has introduced voluntary workshop tutorials in large first‐year courses. The tutorials are based on informal cooperative groupings with structured worksheets and short hands‐on activities. In this study we explore the relationship between attendance at the workshop tutorials and student performance in examinations. We show that about 80% of the students attend more than two‐thirds of the voluntary tutorials. Discounting the students who attend very few tutorials, on average, examination marks improve significantly with increased tutorial attendance. In particular, on average, students with poor senior high school scores have significantly better examination marks if they work in the same group for eight or more tutorials than those who do not work in the same groups. There is evidence that the improvement in examination performance is more pronounced in qualitative concept questions, most dramatically again for students who did poorly in senior high school.

Acknowledgements

The workshop tutorials have benefited from useful discussions with members of the Sydney University Physics Education Research Group (SUPER) and a 1999 Australian National Teaching Development Grant (Organizational). The Science Foundation for Physics within the School of Physics and the Faculty of Science at the University of Sydney have provided financial support.