Following her presentation at our annual learning and teaching conference in July, Jennifer Stott shares her experiences of utilising pub quiz style tests in-class to invigorate her students’ efforts to grasp essential knowledge and concepts in pharmacology.
It was a pleasure to speak at the 2024 Advance HE Teaching and Learning Conference, where I presented a session entitled, “Pub Quizzes for Learning: Gamification of Consolidation Sessions for Hybrid Delivery.”
It was encouraging to see so many colleagues committed to enhancing the student experience, particularly in the context of hybrid learning, where monitoring and ensuring student engagement can often be a challenge.
The issue…
“We had limited visibility into student engagement and comprehension, an issue brought into sharp focus in 2021 when a large cohort of students failed the module. “
At St George’s University of London, hybrid delivery is a key feature of the first two years of the BSc in Clinical Pharmacology. Students are timetabled to attend on-site three days a week and have self-directed learning one day a week. On site days prioritise investigative, practice based, discursive and collaborative learning type activities, with the self-directed sessions more focussed on the acquisition of knowledge. The Fundamentals of Science module requires students to acquire knowledge and so is largely delivered as self-directed learning. However, this posed a significant challenge: without face-to-face interaction, we had limited visibility into student engagement and comprehension, an issue brought into sharp focus in 2021 when a large cohort of students failed the module. Student exam marks plummeted from an average of ~60% in 2020/21 to just over 40%. While there were many factors in play in this time period, not least the impact of Covid-19 on A levels, it highlighted the possibility that there might be an issue with teaching or delivery of the module. Student feedback had rated it highly similarly to previous years so there didn’t seem to be an obvious issue there. However, while we were happy that self-directed sessions were appropriate for the content, it seemed that students might benefit from working with the content to help embed the learning.
The solution…
“We took a student-centred approach…the second part of these workshops is where the gamification comes in…”
This led us to introduce on-site consolidation sessions, a common practice in hybrid delivery. However, simply rehashing online content in person seemed counterproductive. To address this, we took a student-centred approach by creating workshops that combined active learning with gamification. In these sessions students first engage in collaborative activities designed to help them consolidate their learning. Whether through discussions or problem-solving tasks, the focus is on students working with the learning outcomes from the self-directed sessions and leveraging peer-to-peer interactions to enable active construction of knowledge.
The second part of these workshops is where the gamification comes in. We developed a ‘pub quiz’ format, where students form small teams to answer questions on module content. Why a pub quiz? Well as a fan of the traditional pub quiz myself I’ve always found them fun and collaborative – discussing questions with your team mates and learning from them. It was exactly what I envisaged for the students. Translating them into the classroom seemed relatively straightforward – for the avoidance of any doubt, the sessions neither take place in a pub nor involve any alcohol! Students form small groups and are supplied with a blank answer sheet. The quiz takes place during which time they can discuss and confer in their groups. Afterwards, the groups swap quiz sheets and mark each other’s answers. The aim is simple but powerful: to create an engaging, fun environment where students can test their knowledge and learn from one another.
Students must complete the quiz without recourse to new technologies and this is deliberate. University students do so much online now – our whole course is online, not simply PowerPoint slides, but teaching content for tutorials, laboratory and clinical skills sessions are all online. Students collaborate in tutorials via the virtual learning environment, Google docs or educational technologies like Miro or Padlet. All written assessments are completed and submitted online. An answer is often only ever a quick google away in a tutorial, and whilst that might be true in the real world too, it’s not necessarily good practice for exams where no technology is allowed. So, it seemed useful for students to experience an activity that hones their retrieval abilities unaided by technology. What we couldn’t be sure of was how our students, used to online learning, would react to a face-to-face, technology-free pub quiz style challenge?
The answer was: noisily!
The lessons and impact…
“The peer-to-peer learning I’ve witnessed in these sessions is incredible, and in a way quite touching.”
Getting students out from behind their technology meant they had to discuss the questions with each other rather than relying on search engines. The sessions can get loud as students deliberate and debate the questions. The peer-to-peer learning I’ve witnessed in these sessions is incredible, and in a way quite touching. Listening to students discussing content from my lectures together, reminding each other of key points, explaining concepts or correcting misunderstandings is really quite something. The slight competition between the groups makes it fun too – there’s occasionally an ad hoc ‘prize’ but usually the motivation is an intrinsic, self-driven desire to do well and be part of a team. Students commented in the module feedback about how helpful and enjoyable the workshops were, while the average module exam marks bounced back to ~60%.
As an educator, ‘pub quizzes’ are really fun to facilitate (as long as you don’t mind running laps around the teaching room) and they great for spotting stumbling blocks in the cohort. It’s a very simple twist on other types of quizzes in group sessions, with a lot of the benefit coming from having them technology free and a slight gamified element.
By embedding gamified elements like ‘pub quizzes’ into our curricula we can enhance engagement with pre-recorded content in a way that is both educational and enjoyable. ‘Pub quizzes’ can foster collaboration, promote active learning, and, ultimately, lead to better educational outcomes.
Jennifer Stott is a Senior Lecturer in Molecular Pharmacology at St George’s University of London, and the Associate Director of Education and Innovation on the BSc in Clinical Pharmacology. Her practice is shaped by a student-centred, active learning approach
