Traditional approaches to teaching and learning in large undergraduate STEM lectures has not kept pace with the massification and diversification of higher education. Efforts to alleviate learning obstacles call for improved instruction, stipulating the utility of specific pedagogical techniques delineated as “promising practices”; however, little evidence supports their effectiveness. In this study, a quasi-experimental method is applied to a large panel dataset containing course observations and institutional records to investigate the effect of promising practices on student learning. Additionally, differential effects are examined across several important nontraditional and historically under-served populations, such as Hispanic, first-generation, low-income and lower prior ability students. Results suggest that two information relaying techniques—the use of prior content and reviewing exam content—were positively and significantly associated with student outcomes, and estimates were found to be stable across subgroups. Implications for higher education teaching and learning, as well as empirical research in these areas, are discussed.

大型本科STEM讲课中的传统教学方法并没有跟上高等教育的大众化和多样化。减轻学习障碍的努力要求改进教学，规定使用被称为“有前途的做法”的特定教学技术的实用性；但是，几乎没有证据支持它们的有效性。在这项研究中，将准实验方法应用于包含课程观察和机构记录的大型面板数据集，以研究有前途的做法对学生学习的影响。此外，还对几个重要的非传统和历史上服务不足的人群（例如西班牙裔，第一代，低收入和较低先验能力的学生）进行了研究。结果表明，两种信息中继技术（使用先验内容和复习考试内容）与学生成绩呈正相关且显着相关，并且发现在各亚组中估计值是稳定的。讨论了对高等教育教学和这些领域的实证研究的意义。