Teaching and learning in the context of mass lecture

Mass lecture is commonly recognized as an acceptable mode of teaching in higher education for its cost-effectiveness. Teacher educators, however, are concerned with the quality of teaching and learning in mass lecture as effective teacher education builds on constructivist, experiential learning that can be best advanced through mutually developmental lecturer-student interactions. How to ensure the effective use of mass lecture in teacher education is therefore a practical issue with significance and should be systematically explored in an authentic situation. This paper reports a case study about the contributive factors that support pre-service teachers’ learning in mass lectures. The process of inquiry includes a spiral of activities to plan-act-observe-reflect. It is found that use of multi-media, buzz group, a short break, pre-lecture reading, and post-lecture tutorial and activities facilitating student self-assessment are contributive to learning. A note-worthy effect is the enhanced collegiality among members of the action research team developed during this process of participatory inquiry. Copyright © 2003 The Hong Kong Institute of Education.