We describe how a practical instructional development process helped a first-year assistant professor rapidly develop, implement, and assess the impact on her Analytical Chemistry course caused by three changes: (a) moving the lab into the same semester as the lecture, (b) developing a more collaborative classroom environment, and (c) increasing…

In higher education, supporting students with special educational needs (SEN) necessitates an understanding of these needs, additional teaching aids and innovative ideas. The teacher must be an integral part of this support process, and this is difficult for the majority of teachers, due to their lack of core understanding of SEN. However,…

Students often struggle in introductory health sciences courses; some students have difficulty in upper level classes. To address this, we converted three lecture/lab courses, traditional first-year Anatomy and Physiology (A&P I), upper level Biomechanics, and upper level Microbiology to an integrated studio model. We used the Student…

Research in the area of amount of time spent on assignments and effect on course performance has focused exclusively either on the lecture or online format, but not comparison of the two. Nowhere has both modes of delivery been studied using an objective measure of course involvement. This study examines what is most significant in predicting a…

This paper is a report of an investigation in which mobile technologies were used during large lecture-type sessions in tandem with the Textwall™ software. This online program is able to receive and present messages from students' devices that the lecturer may then share. It also can be used to collect student votes on multiple-choice questions,…

The authors have completed a 2-year quasi-experimental study on the use of inquiry-based learning (IBL) in precalculus. This study included six traditional lecture-style courses and seven modified Moore method courses taught by three instructors. Both quantitative and qualitative analyses were used to investigate the attitudes and beliefs of the…

Since MOOC is suffering high dropout rate, researchers try to explore the reasons and mitigate it. Focusing on this task, we employ a composite model to infer behaviors of learners in the coming weeks based on his/her history log of learning activities, including interaction with video lectures, participation in discussion forum, and performance…

Most instructors are looking for ways to improve student engagement in higher education classrooms across the globe. With the influx of tablets and laptops as the tool for students in the 21st century, the question arises of how best to integrate technology into the design of a lecture and is there a difference when designing a lecture with…

This paper reports on one phase of a research project examining the National College of Teaching and Leadership's (NCTL) revised methodology for the allocation of postgraduate ITE places for the 2016-17 academic year. The paper's focus is the often-neglected voices of applicants as they negotiated this process, for whom this revised methodology…

We live in a world permeated by digital technologies. Still, however, this digitization is not always reflected in the learning environments of higher education institutions, which raises questions about the adequacy of the instructional outcomes. In this paper, I maintain that the concept of the inverted or flipped classroom may be a fruitful…

Lecture videos are amongst the most widely used instructional methods within present Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) and other digital educational platforms. As the main form of instruction, student engagement behaviour, including interaction with videos, directly impacts the student success or failure and accordingly, in-video dropouts…

In this paper, the authors discuss the effectiveness of MOOCs as part of a pedagogical strategy aimed at supporting Physics' preliminary undergraduate students in large-size lectures. Our study is based on an experimental activity based on a blended course, which integrated a parallel MOOC delivered through the POK (PoliMi Open Knowledge,…

Although online education is popularized, it is in a developing stage that continues to struggle with communicating and engaging with students. The question remains on how students can be better engaged in online educational materials that are presented in asynchronous media, especially in lecture videos. Thus, using engagement theory, the present…

The purpose of this study was to evaluate an online training program designed for part-time undergraduate Desk Assistants (DAs) employed by Louisiana State University's (LSU) department of Residence Education. The evaluation of the training program included a comparison of video and lecture versions of a training program with comparable content to…

Within the last 10 years, new tools for assisting in the teaching and learning of academic skills and content within the context of science have arisen. These new tools include multiple types of computer software and hardware to include (video) games. The purpose of this study was to examine and compare the effect of computer learning games in the…