The students engaged in higher education are now expected to be creative, proficient and problem solvers in their field of expertise. However, for this to take place, the teaching-learning process in higher education is required to be implemented properly using the right methodology in relation to the subject. 

Looking towards the global trends, education practices are now moving towards new active learning methods; thereby helping the institutes to make the learners more creative and competent. Today, the active learning models have evolved as an innovative model that ensures high-quality, collaborative, engaging, and motivating education. It also engages the learners in the process of learning through activities and/or discussion in class, and it increases learners’ higher order thinking as compared to passively listening to a lecturer.

In the days to come, active learning methods will positively influence the overall educational environment, creating massive change about how education is perceived, approached and conveyed. In this article, let's look into the most significant advantages that active learning brings with it.

Contextualized Learning

Instead of only learning abstract knowledge, contextualized learning entails learning in real-world contexts. An illustration of this is the difference between learning division by rote and learning division by physically grouping items. As it entails learning by engaging with problems through situations and projects rather than learning from books or by repetition, active learning tends to be contextualized.

Students can better comprehend what they are studying and how it relates to their daily lives with the aid of a contextualized learning scenario. The ability to recall knowledge by considering the context in which it first appeared can be improved by teaching students in context.

In fact, contextualized learning helps to increase the retention rate. According to Dale’s Cone of Experience, students remember about 10% of what they read, 20% of what they hear, but 90% of what they do. Students are often applying their ideas, working on collaborative projects or using approaches like design thinking or the agile process to solidify their learning.

Boosting Creativity and Free Thinking

Creativity involves the use of our own original thinking and imagination to come to answers. It assists us in actually developing new information and opening up new possibilities. When students learn by "doing," they are encouraged to come up with their own solutions and take chances rather than merely accepting the supplied solutions as "taken for granted."

Today, one of the essential abilities for the workplace of the future is creativity, which is also one of the trickiest to impart through conventional teaching approaches. Students that engage in active learning realize that creativity is a process that takes time, effort, and hard work to develop. Pupils who have had a lot of practice using their creative muscles also understand how both personal contemplation and group discussion may result in better ideas and more original solutions to issues.

Increased Learner Empowerment

Empowerment in the academic setting is the approach and practice of supporting learners to become able to shape their learning and study for a sustainable future. So, learner empowerment is giving more autonomy and ownership for the learners in their learning in the instructional process and ultimately produces an intrinsic desire to learn. Learners become effective in their learning when they are empowered. Learners should be empowered for every activity in the instructional process. When learners are empowered, they become motivated, work harder, and strive for a better performance.

The active learning process also invites learners to assess their own and others’ work, which means self- and peer assessments are the dominant assessment methods in the empowerment of students. Self- and peer assessments are being increasingly used in higher education to help students learn more efficiently. Assessment can provide feedback to the instructor themselves to improve their instructional process and to check how the learning is going on.

Wrapping Up

Active learning is evolving as one of the best approaches to learning and teaching. It is a broad term that describes many different forms of learning, including play-based, collaborative and inquiry based.

This constructive based approach to learning will emphasize the importance of learning through experience rather than absorbing facts verbatim from the teacher. In the future, It will encourage students to discover facts themselves so they genuinely believe and understand the reasons why something is ‘true’ or ‘accurate’.