While Eric Brewe was a student attending Elston High School in picturesque Michigan City, Ind., he took a physics lab in which the teacher, Mr. Evett, challenged him and his classmates to predict where a ball might land after rolling down a ramp.
It became a moment of clarity for Brewe. “I got it exactly right,” Brewe said. “I loved the idea of being able to predict a future event with just a few measurements.”
Around 16 years old at the time, Brewe knew then he wanted to become a college professor teaching in the classroom. Those early lessons sparked by the active learning in Mr. Evett’s class served as inspiration for Brewe and his professional journey as professor of Physics and Science Education Teaching, Learning, and Curriculum in Drexel’s College of Arts and Sciences (CoAS) and School of Education (SoE), respectively.
In addition to those roles, Brewe holds the positions of associate dean of graduate education in CoAS, associate editor with Physical Review Physics Education Research, as well as a Provost Solutions Fellow.
The experience Brewe had as a high school student also helped inform his experience in graduate school at Arizona State University. There, Brewe discovered that while fond of physics, his passions lay elsewhere — in education. He channeled those two interests into the focus of his studies and, eventually, a career in higher education.
“I went to grad school to basically do condensed matter experiments and quickly found out that wasn’t for me,” he said. “I was drifting around and ran into a research group focused on education and decided to use that as a jumping off point into what I was really interested in. I always thought understanding humans is one of the hardest things to do, and understanding learning is so fundamental to the human experience. It became a wonderful opportunity to do two things I care about. It was serendipitous.”
Brewe’s interest in how students learn and improving how they learn, especially the subject of physics, led him to focus on discipline-based education research (DBER). This area incorporates the knowledge of teaching and learning with the challenges learners face trying to comprehend STEM content: “We draw on cognitive science, economics, sociology and educational theory,” he said.
Through this work, Brewe has uncovered ways to better understand how learning works inside and outside of the classroom to improve teaching and learning methods.
Brewe’s work has led to his championing an active learning pedagogy in physics. Learning, he says, is an active process and instructional approaches should reflect that.
“Everything I do is active learning,” he said. “That is the difference between teaching and learning. I focus on the students. The goal of teaching is not teaching but learning. You might craft a lovely lecture, but if students don’t get what they need out of it, it’s not worth it.”
Brewe developed a lecture-free curriculum for introductory physics and found students have a better understanding of the subject, improved retention rates and an increased likelihood of continuing in physics, among other research findings.
Another area Brewe delved into focuses on using network analysis and structured classroom observation protocol to characterize active learning in physics. He found that networks formed by student interactions among their peers during a class matter.
Networks cultivated among students are driven by instructional approach, and, when encouraged, provide supportive interactions and promote the flow and retention of information. Social isolation during a class can produce negative effects and be predictive of grades in future classes, according to Brewe’s research.
“I believe you learn more from each other and that learning happens socially. Learning in isolation is problematic,” Brewe said. “You learn through interactions with other humans, and sometimes that’s done directly and sometimes indirectly. We teach learning as an individual sport but it’s a team sport.”
Brewe turns to Modeling Instruction (MI) when he teaches as opposed to relying on traditional lectures. This pedagogical approach builds upon his research on networks developed within a classroom environment. With MI, discussion and student-centered learning are key instructional components.
Students work together in groups or one-on-one to talk through ideas, solve problems and model concepts on whiteboards. This fosters interaction, collaboration and critical thinking. The act of writing and working through concepts on a whiteboard serves as another way to reinforce learning.
Student testimonials attest to the effectiveness of the MI teaching method. “I liked the overall interactive, discussion-based instruction,” said one former student who shared their opinion after taking a course with Brewe. “This class was much, much more understandable and helpful than my traditional lecture-based classes.”
With a firsthand understanding of the outcomes of active learning, Brewe wants to ensure more students have access to these experiences. He currently leads modeling workshops to train future college professors teaching physics and also serves as co-editor of the PhysTEC-sponsored book, Recruiting and Educating Future Physics Teachers: Case Studies and Effective Practices.