ABSTRACTINVESTIGATING CHINESE MASTER'S STUDENTS EXPERIENCES WITH ACTIVE LEARNING METHODS AT A U.S. PUBLIC RESEARCH UNIVERSITYBy Nathan J. Clason This study explored how students from China make sense of their experiences of active learning strategies in U.S. master's programs. There has been a significant increase over the past decade in the number of international students enrolled in U.S. higher education institutions. The influx of international students most recently has been led by a dramatic increase in the number of students from China. However, faculty perceptions of these students, reports of international student frustrations, and previous research on teaching and learning among students from China suggests that more research is needed to understand how these students make sense of their experiences in U.S. classrooms. This qualitative study asked seven students from China enrolled in the Master of Business Administration, Master of Public Policy, and Master of Science in Environmental Engineering programs at a large research university to describe their experiences with the various teaching and learning strategies that they encountered in their programs. Phenomenological research methods were used to better understand the meaning that they attach to their experiences. A distinctive finding was the combination of factors that seem to influence how these students develop preferences and expectations for particular teaching and learning methods. These students' educational cultures are influential in shaping how they make sense of their experiences in U.S. classrooms, but so are their expectations for the outcomes they associate with graduate level education and the effects of socialization within their master's programs. The findings also challenge many prevailing views about Chinese students. The conclusions that some professors draw from their observations of Chinese students may be incomplete or altogether inaccurate. The students in this study revealed that relationships with their professors and classmates - including domestic, Chinese, and international classmates - are important to managing the learning activities in their master's programs; they are self-directed in regards to learning activities based upon their backgrounds and interests; they acknowledge that culture is a factor in how they view their experiences in U.S. classrooms; they value teaching and learning strategies that focus on applying course content to realistic problems; and they regularly encounter barriers to participation related to English language, different ways of thinking, and domestic classmates who dominate small group and class discussions.
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