Dynamics online course: A challenge content delivered with best teaching practices keeps students engaged
Conference
Muller-Karger, CM, Steiner, L. (2020). Dynamics online course: A challenge content delivered with best teaching practices keeps students engaged
. 2020-June
Muller-Karger, CM, Steiner, L. (2020). Dynamics online course: A challenge content delivered with best teaching practices keeps students engaged
. 2020-June
Dynamics is a core course in the mechanical and civil engineering programs; and, because of its complexity, this course continues to represent one of the main challenges facing our students. Historically, faculty were resistant to deliver the content of this course online. In order to offer an equivalent, or better yet, an improved class session experience, we pursued engagement following best practices to design this course online. Our practices include course structure, alignment of critical course components, different forms of assessment and accessibility. We structured the course very granularly based on the learning theories framework, and used instructional technologies to produce single-concept videos designed for the module topics. The course was organized into nine modules, and the content within them was divided into short narrated lectures presenting the theoretical background and single-concept videos using LearningGlassTM were added in order to solve examples related to the mentioned theoretical framework. The advantage of the example videos is that students can watch them repeatedly the week they are released and again while doing their homework or studying for exams. Each module also provided assessed activities such as assignments and quizzes. In the process of course design, we used a backward design framework, which helped us gain a clear idea of the students' learning outcomes and the ABET outcomes. As a result, we were able to revisit and refine the course learning objectives and write the specific module learning objectives. Accordingly, we reviewed and adjusted the learning activities and assessed activities, such as assignments, quizzes, exams, discussions, among others, in order to be aligned with the learning objectives. We also included well-defined expectations on every assessed activity by establishing clear criteria using rubrics for all evaluated activities. Last but not least, by using accessibility features in all the course elements, we were able to successfully target a diverse student population and benefit the learning community as a whole. This paper will also provide the highlights and the rationale behind the selection of these educational technology tools and determine how they foster quality course delivery. To best illustrate course impact on students, we qualitatively and quantitatively analyzed data collected from four different sources, some of them for four consecutive terms regarding grades, students' perception, and developed skills.
