The Pedagogy Project: Elucidating Effective Lecture Break Use

Like many other areas of pedagogy, lectures stand to gain much from better incorporating underutilized research, knowledge and tools to the benefit of all stakeholders. This project looks at how undergraduate students, in particular, can benefit from one such tool in the pause procedure. The premise of the pause procedure is simply to insert one or more pauses throughout the lecture, and its benefits in the classroom can be further bolstered by using active learning strategies during these pauses. The described study tested the efficacy of three possible iterations of the pause procedure against a free-for-all pause control incorporated into a contemporary mock lecture in an online learning environment. Measures of student learning, memory and subjective learning experience were compared to determine the efficacy of each iteration and the pause procedure overall in this context. In addition, potential mechanisms of action for the pause procedure’s efficacy as well as the role of academic resourcefulness to represent diverse student abilities and needs were explored for the first time in the literature.