Background: The substantial growth in gamification research has connected gamified learning to enhanced engagement, improved performance, and greater motivation. Similar to gamification, personalized learning analytics dashboards can enhance student engagement. Objectives: This study explores the student experiences and academic achievements using…

Online courses can feel isolating and sometimes lack human connections that can motivate students. We developed a fully online geoscience course to build a 'Community of Inquiry' with attention to cognitive, social, and teaching presences. We ran the course using nearly identical materials for 8 semesters (recorded video lectures, labs,…

Promoting collaboration and discourse in asynchronous online courses is challenging; students need something engaging to talk about, a communications medium in which to fluidly discuss it, and a social environment that supports discourse. We designed a fully online introductory geoscience lecture and lab course called Geology Goes Hollywood that…

People with disabilities are chronically underrepresented in many geoscience departments across the country. There are a number of proposed reasons why this under-representation persists, one of which is lack of instructor training in designing accessible curriculum and making high-quality accommodations. This not only puts students with…

We compare student learning and perception data from astronomy, physics, and geology courses taught in a traditional classroom with individual desks to the same classes taught in a large auditorium. In a large student sample (1,593 students), there is no clear difference between rooms in measures of failure rates or average final grades. However,…