Monday, January 31, 2011
Getting buy-in for blended learning
Encouraging students to embrace blended learning is not always an easy task. Sometimes it is necessary to use some "gentle" nudging in the form of grades for participation. Many students are wary of the online environment, others are uncomfortable. Persistence will yield results however.
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Quite true. I also feel sorry for those students who have no computer or Internet access at home and have to rely on the computer labs at the university to access their courses on myeLearning. That, too, we as lecturers have to consider - even if it is just emphathising and showing some understanding when students have problems with the blended style of learning which are out of their control.
ReplyDeleteOur Department (Economics) is guilty of this, because of little or no participation at the year one and sometimes the year two levels, marks are assigned to the online component. However, we have unfortunately discovered, if the marks assigned are too low, the students maybe tell themselves that it is not worth it and some of them forgo the marks. Also Geraldine, I take your point, of late we have been trying to assess exactly how many people have computers, have access to internet, etc. since we have become aware that sometimes what we take for granted is not always so.
ReplyDeleteHaving just created a blended learning course, I am now faced with the difficulty of having to implement it with the third year veterinary students. This, as Dr Dianne has rightfully pointed out, is no easy task. Traditionally, students are taught using primarily the didactic lecturing approach (until entry into the clinical years). They seem somewhat opposed to the idea of an online element to the course. Interestingly enough, so do most of my superiors!
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