The first blended learning course in the Faculty of Arts and Science at Queen’s University in Kingston, was offered in the academic year 2011-12 to encourage more active learning, especially in first-year and high-enrolment courses. The coordinated approach that Queen’s chose to implement for blended learning is described in the 2012 Pocket of Innovation entitled, Engaging First-Year Students: A Blended Learning Model for Active Learning.
The Faculty of Arts and Science Blended Learning Initiative (BLI) has continued, with blended courses being developed that respond to the content and student needs in various disciplines. Pockets of Innovation prepared in 2014 look at distinct applications of blended learning in Calculus, Sociology, and Classics, as well as the broader faculty-wide planning, support, and research context.
Dr. Alan Ableson was teaching Math 121 Calculus, an applied course offered to first-year students not planning to major in mathematics. The course was offered in three sections with three-hour face-to-face lectures for 350 students at a time, and practice problems completed on their own time. A survey indicated a low level of student engagement with the content and with its applicability to their areas of academic interest, whether this was business, education, biology, or sociology. Dr. Ableson saw blended learning, particularly the flipped classroom model of using class time for problem-solving, as offering potential for addressing the issues of engagement and applicability of learning.
Each module, designed by Dr. Ableson with substantial help from an instructional designer and graduate students, was built to encourage active learning, individual and group problem-solving, as well as understanding of key concepts and their applicability to different fields of study.
- Online Lectures: Topic-specific, recorded lectures are the core of the content delivery, made available the week before the class meeting. The lectures are short (10-15 minutes) and feature explanations of theory and applications demonstrated on a virtual white board. All the lectures from the course are available on YouTube. The videos were initially prepared for a summer course and proved to be successful. They were recently re-done and are expected to be useful, with minor revisions, for two to three years.
- Pre-Class Questions: Each week of video lectures leads to a pre-class questionnaire, with three problem-solving exercises and an opportunity for students to submit questions and comments. About three-quarters of the students complete the pre-class exercise each week. The professor for each section then reviews the input from his or her students before each class, and uses that input to develop a series of problems to be addressed in the face-to-face meeting (150-200 students). The review of this input takes the professors about an hour before each meeting.
- Classroom Activities: The face-to-face class begins with a short lecture, followed by guided problem-solving exercises. The students complete each problem individually at first and indicate their response with clickers. If the answers are correct, the class moves on. If responses are not correct, the students talk in small groups about the solution and then re-submit their answers. This peer instruction strategy resulted in clearly improved accuracy in the class period, and good quality discussion inside the classroom. About three-quarters of the students attend these face-to-face sessions, which is significantly higher attendance than when the class was in its more traditional all-lecture format.
- Practice Problem Class: In Fall 2013, students were also scheduled for a second hour-long session, with optional attendance. Initially, what Dr. Ableson termed a “motivating lecture” was offered, on how math can be applied in a wide range of subject areas. Despite good quality lectures, attendance fell to just 30 out of 350 students after the first couple of weeks. Even with the introduction of practical problems to the lecture, attendance did not improve over the term. Some students reported that while they were interested, they felt too pressed for time and needed to focus on activities that would improve their grades.
- Practice Problem Sessions Re-Designed: In the Winter 2014 term, this optional class meeting was re-designed with students being asked which problems they wanted addressed or else the professors offered problems to review specific points. Attendance increased back to between a third and half of the students.
- Tutorials: In the earlier traditional model for the course, students were assigned to a tutorial group of up to 120 students, and students could bring questions to a teaching assistant in that session. Attendance was very low in these meetings, often with only a handful of students taking advantage of the assistance offered.
- Tutorials Re-Designed: For Fall 2013 and Winter 2014 terms, students were assigned to bi-weekly tutorial groups of 40 students each, and the format was changed to a more activity-centered active learning lab. Each activity was structured to cover larger-scale applications that were explicitly not covered in class. Students worked through these activities in groups of four.
- Tutorials with Common and Interest-Specific Applications: In the first term, these activities were common for all students, which limited them to topics common to all students. In the winter term, students could select between applications in business or in biology/ecology. These parallel winter term activities were largely designed by a graduate student. For the September 2014 term, the first few weeks of the tutorial will cover generic applications, with students choosing their specialization for the latter weeks.
- Online Self-Tests: Each week, students have between 30 and 70 practice problems available to hone their skills; full solutions are provided so students can assess their own success as they go. To assist in more objective assessment, they also complete 3-5 similar problems online for a small grade. Before submitting, students can work through a variety of problem sets until they are happy with their results.
Outcomes and Benefits
With the move to blended delivery, the median grade for the course remained the same, but the failure rate fell by about half (8% to 5%). Attrition was roughly comparable between the two models.
Research based on CLASSE, the Classroom Survey of Student Engagement, showed statistically significant improvement in five key measures: active learning during class; student-faculty interactions; higher order thinking skills; course challenges; and student writing skills. The first three were particular goals of the re-design.
Challenges and Enhancements
Communication with the students about the structure of the course, the requirements, options, and supports available is difficult. In order to simplify the management of the course for the students, reminders and support are offered so that they can get into the content with less attention to the details.
There were over 1,500 e-mails from students during the course, mostly dealing with procedures, technology, grades, and special case issues regarding assignments. The Teaching Assistants responded to the e-mails, with guidance from Dr. Ableson as Course Coordinator. The other professors teaching the course were not involved, for simplicity and consistency.
Dr. Ableson would like to provide more support for students who are struggling with the course. Early identification is available through the multiple routes in the new format, so students can be referred earlier to support services, both those within the course and others available at the university.
As part of the weekly exercises, students submit questions, some of which are then addressed in the subsequent classes or tutorial sessions. But as the professor received this input the day before the face-to-face class and so, in many cases, responses to individual questions were not offered. A system is now being set up for direct e-mail response to questions, providing students with not only answers, but also a better sense of connection.
For Further Information
Dr. Alan Ableson
Assistant Adjunct Professor
Department of Mathematics and Statistics