Title: Blending across the curriculum

Authors: Maureen E. Dunbar; Ivan A. Shibley Jr.

Addresses: Division of Science, Penn State Berks, P.O. Box 7009, Reading, PA, USA ' Division of Science, Penn State Berks, P.O. Box 7009, Reading, PA, USA

Abstract: By deliberately planning a number of blended courses within the science curriculum a more learner-centred program was created. This paper presents evidence that blending can improve efficiency as measured by increases in student satisfaction, increased enrolment, greater flexibility with scheduling, and shorter time to graduation. By deploying similar pedagogies and technologies across a range of courses the extraneous cognitive load for learners can be decreased. The most important technologies discussed in this article are: screencasting, clickers, and online quizzes. The findings presented here suggest that blending across an entire curriculum holds great potential for institutions to increase efficiency and effectiveness of programs.

Keywords: active learning; blended learning; classroom response systems; cognition; course design; curriculum design; flipped design; learner-centred; STEM; science education; technology education; engineering education; mathematics education; screencasting; efficiency; student satisfaction; enrolment; scheduling flexibility; graduation time; clickers; online quizzes.

DOI: 10.1504/IJSMILE.2016.077579

International Journal of Social Media and Interactive Learning Environments, 2016 Vol.4 No.2, pp.109 - 123

Received: 30 Aug 2015
Accepted: 09 Oct 2015

Published online: 06 Jul 2016 *

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