Is Traditional Teaching Really All That Bad? A Within-Student Between-Subject Approach
34 Pages Posted: 29 Apr 2009
Date Written: April 2009
Abstract
Recent studies conclude that teachers are important for student learning but it remains uncertain what actually determines effective teaching. This study directly peers into the black box of educational production by investigating the relationship between lecture style teaching and student achievement. Based on matched student-teacher data for the US, the estimation strategy exploits between-subject variation to control for unobserved student traits. Results indicate that traditional lecture style teaching is associated with significantly higher student achievement. No support for detrimental effects of lecture style teaching can be found even when evaluating possible selection biases due to unobservable teacher characteristics.
Keywords: teaching practices, educational production, TIMSS, between-subject variation
JEL Classification: I21, C23
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation
Do you have a job opening that you would like to promote on SSRN?
Recommended Papers
-
New Evidence on Classroom Computers and Pupil Learning
By Joshua D. Angrist and Victor Lavy
-
The Impact of Internet Subsidies in Public Schools
By Austan Goolsbee and Jonathan Guryan
-
By Cecilia E. Rouse and Alan B. Krueger
-
By Ludger Woessmann and Thomas Fuchs
-
The Effect of Extra Funding for Disadvantaged Pupils on Achievement
By Edwin Leuven, Mikael Lindahl, ...
-
New Technology in Schools: Is There a Payoff?
By Stephen J. Machin, Sandra Mcnally, ...
-
Home Computer Use and the Development of Human Capital
By Ofer Malamud and Cristian Pop-eleches
-
Technology's Edge: The Educational Benefits of Computer-Aided Instruction
By Lisa Barrow, Lisa Markman, ...