Open self-paced introductory course in nuclear engineering – How to guarantee student learning

Abstract

Ease of access to various free educational resources on the internet has often the disadvantage of resulting in scattered and fragmented knowledge and skills. Students “pick and choose” what they believe to be relevant for their learning but lack the necessary overview of the field to select those resources adequately and properly. This also applies to nuclear engineering, for which educational materials can be found on the web. Although some Massive Open Online Courses exist in this area, access to those often requires registration, or those courses are given during limited times. Following the Open Educational Resources initiative, there was thus a need to develop educational materials that are truly open and freely accessible to all, while guaranteeing student learning. This paper reports on efforts along those lines, which resulted in the planning, development, implementation and offering of three self-paced open course modules in nuclear engineering. Through a careful course design and use of the various features of a specific educator-to-educator Learning Management System, the students are guided through highly structured course materials capitalizing on a diversity of activities proposed to the students. Through self-assessment competence tests, the students can measure their mastery of the field, ultimately resulting in the delivery of a certificate of successful completion of the modules. This paper also presents, from a teacher’s perspective, some lessons learnt that could benefit other teachers interested in embarking on similar endeavours.