Comparative Study of Problem Based Learning and Traditional Lecture Delivery-A Case Study

In order to contrast the pedagogies and results, the class of final year, divided into two strings-The PBL string and the Traditional string. PBL class could not support a large size; the number was limited to 25. Traditional String was quite traditional with the students sitting in the classroom in rows, facing the teacher. The demarcation of Lecture, Tutorial and Practical classes was quite clear. The teacher gave lecture in lecture classes, made the students practice closed ended problems in tutorial classes and made the students do experiments in the practical classes, in a typical laboratory set up. For the PBL string, there was no structured plan in terms of delivery of content. However the teacher termed Facilitator - prepared a complete set of Technical Nodes and Learning Objectives. The role of the teacher was changed from the "contentdelivery- man" to a facilitator.