What is Master Learning? – By Benjamin Todd Eller

MASTER LEARNING

Some students see master learning as irritating, but I see it as a gift. If you give a gift in your classroom, make sure it is offered to all students regardless of their backgrounds or who they are. Master Learning was created by Benjamin Bloom. It involves going over the same lessons until mastery occurs. A meta-analysis by Kulik et al (2013) found that exam scores improved from 50th to the 70th percentile, in colleges, high schools, and the upper grades of elementary schools.

Master Learning does not so much emphasize content but simply the opportunity for the students to demonstrate mastery of a subject more than once. Here are some steps you can use for all students:

Small sequential steps of instruction
Frequent and specific feedback to all students
The tests are criterion-referenced rather than norm
Evaluations are made on what students have learned and not learned.
When students have not made at least a “B” on an exam or subject area, they are allowed to have more time to master the material.

For instance, in a business course that I teach, my first quiz is only ten questions. For those students who got at least a “B” on the quiz, they are excused from revisiting that material. For the students who made below a “B,” they are required to re-take that quiz for partial credit on the next exam day. Therefore, a lack of mastery requires students to take additional quizzes in the future. This allows students to take more time, if needed, to master the material as well as give the students an incentive to do well on a quiz on the first try.

The reason that I put Master Learning in the chapter about diversity includes the ability to maintain fairness and to help you in the event you ever receive a complaint. It is my assertion that all of us are human and none of us has 100% full awareness of how we behave. I remember I had a friend who was 34 years old, and she was dating a man who was 50 years old. She told me that this man’s daughter might be someone that I could date. She then said: Wait a minute, his daughter is 26 years old. You are too old for her. I was actually only eight years older than her at the time. I then pointed out to my friend that she was dating a man 16 years older than her. She paused and said: Oh yeah. She was quick to judge that I was too old for a woman eight years younger but simply failed to deal with the fact that her age gap with her boyfriend was higher. Please know that I had no judgment about her dating someone older. I just found it interesting that she was not that self-aware.

One of my favorite movies is Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner? The great Spencer Tracy plays a very liberal man living in San Francisco. He believes he is liberal until his daughter brings home an African-American fiancé portrayed by the great Sydney Poitier. His subconscious racist feelings come to the surface as he initially cannot approve of his daughter getting married.

Beyond racism, sometimes we just naturally like someone more than others. Again, this is human. A professor may prefer a student because s/he is charismatic, complimentary or attractive. I heard a coach say once: When you treat someone differently than someone else, you are being unfair. I think this is somewhat inevitable as we all at least have preferences. Harvard University conducted a study where they found that doctors treated Latino and African-American patients very differently than Caucasians. When Caucasians suffered a broken leg, MDs were far more likely to prescribe pain medication than minorities with the same injury (Lyubansky, 2012). These doctors would not admit to themselves they were racist or prejudice. Sometimes we are just unaware.

Master Learning helps solve the mere appearance of bias of any professor or educator. First, regardless of who your students are, master learning concepts allows every student the opportunity to re-take exams and more time to learn new material. Also, if you are ever accused of bias for any reason, master learning allows you to defend your curriculum as you can state that you give multiple opportunities to every student to master your course. I have never known a professor to never be complained about in some fashion over their careers. Finally, master learning works. It helps your students reach higher levels of achievement.