Teaching Online Courses Research Articles

Effects of a structured online educational program course on nursing students' attitudes toward gender roles and women and children's violence abuse reports: A quasi-experimental evaluation

BackgroundIt is important to know the rights of women and children while shaping attitudes toward gender roles, violence against women, and reporting child abuse. To shape attitudes toward reporting abuse, women's and children's rights courses should be integrated into undergraduate nursing curriculum. It is important to develop positive attitudes of nursing students toward gender roles, violence against women, and reporting child abuse. ObjectivesThe aim of the study was to evaluate the effects of a “women's–children's rights” online-educational program in a nursing curricula. DesignA pretest–posttest follow-up with a control group quasi-experimental trial. SettingsNursing department of the state university in Turkey. ParticipantsFourth-year students (N = 62) of a nursing department at the state university in Turkey constituted the study sample. The students were divided into two groups: education and control groups with each group comprising 31 fourth-year nursing students. MethodsThe education group took the women's–children's rights online-course, whereas the control group did not. In both groups, baseline assessments were performed online using the “Gender Roles Attitude Scale,” “Violence Against Women Attitude Scale,” and “Healthcare Provider Attitudes Toward Child Maltreatment Reporting Scale.” The posttest (T1) was conducted immediately after the 14-week course was completed. Follow-up was performed after 1 month (T2). Numbers, percentages, chi-square test, t-test, Kolmogorov–Smirnov test, Pearson's correlation, and Duncan's test were conducted using SPSS 20.00 software. ResultsThe education group's scores of attitudes toward gender roles, violence against women, and reporting child abuse/neglect were significantly higher than those of the control group (p < 0.05). After the online program, a significant difference between the groups and between the measurements was observed in the education group (p < 0.05). ConclusionsThe women's–children's rights online-course is an effective method in educating and enriching nursing students on women's and children's rights.

A Method for Recommending Sports Network Course Resources Based on Collaborative Filtering Technology

In the process of online course resource recommendation, the output of recommendation results is often unstable. Therefore, a physical education online course resource recommendation method based on collaborative filtering technology is proposed. Firstly, the learning preference of e-learners is calculated, the frequency index of the word frequency-inverse document is defined, the correlation between courses is reflected, and the specific needs of students for PE online course resource recommendation are understood. Then, the collaborative filtering recommendation algorithm is used to generate the similarity matrix and correlation matrix, update the edge characteristics of sports online curriculum resources, collect and refine the hidden index of sports online curriculum resources, optimize the prediction rules of the neighborhood of the most similar teaching unit, and complete the recommendation of sports online curriculum resources. Experimental results show that, for 1000 keywords, the method has the highest single average matching degree, the recommendation process is stable, and the F1 value is more than 0.9, and the practical application is ensured.

Development of a Didactic Online Course Concept for Heterogeneous Audience Groups in the Context of Healthcare IT.

Building a well-founded understanding of the concepts, tasks and limitations of IT in all areas of society is an essential prerequisite for future developments in business and research. This applies in particular to the healthcare sector and medical research, which are affected by the noticeable advances in digitization. In the transfer project "Zukunftslabor Gesundheit" (ZLG), a teaching framework was developed to support the development of further education online courses in order to teach heterogeneous groups of learners independent of location and prior knowledge. The study at hand describes the development and components of the framework.

Multimedia Open Educational Resource Materials for Teaching-Online Diversity and Leadership: Aligning Bloom’s Taxonomy and Studio Habits of Mind

Objective: The purpose of this study was to explore, develop, test, and refine processes to incorporate meaningful and equitable use of open educational resources (OER) in online classrooms. Method: The intent of this qualitative study was to use an action research process of interactive discussions between higher education practitioners to shape collective understanding of how to teach in an online learning environment using OER. Results: The study resulted in the identification six exemplar learning opportunities which could be incorporated into the blended pedagogical model. Each exemplar OER included all four types of knowledge as defined by Bloom's taxonomy and required skills of observe and envision as defined in the Studio Habits of Mind (SHoM). A second criteria for our purposive selection was that each exemplar could be used to teach in multiple contexts for multiple purposes across a spectrum of higher education online courses. Conclusion: This study reminds us that educators need a new mindset to work with multimedia and visual resources. The blended pedagogical model provides scaffold teaching and learning opportunities that were not visible in either Bloom's taxonomy or SHoM alone. This blended pedagogical model scaffolds the “how” when using a visual approach to curriculum development that may enrich the learning experiences of students when presented in online higher education classrooms. Implication for Practice: Educators might replicate this study or transfer findings for purposes of comparing and testing further the use of OER in their online higher education classes to further engage student learning. Applying new understanding in a project that is shared with the larger learning group is essential as students understand and begin to own new skills and insights. The blended pedagogical model presented in this paper could be helpful to educators to maximize the benefits from the integration of technology and OERs to support online higher education.

The Transformation to an Online Course in Higher Education Results in Better Student Academic Performance

Pandemic-forced remote teaching has highlighted the relevance of redesigning planification in order to transform face-to-face into online courses in higher education. Indeed, the type of e-learning activities, e-assessment and development of student-centred active learning tasks remains a challenge. In this work we investigated the academic performance of an online learning environment in a course with high number of enrolled students carried out in the pandemic context in 2020 and compared it to the 2019 face-to-face version of the course. The e-learning version of the course included some changes regarding the face-to-face to allow active student learning, digital learning environment, knowledge enforcement, and further exploitation of the available activities in the Moodle platform as for the face-to-face course, although the syllabus remained unchanged. This study finds both synchronous and asynchronous problem-solving based e-learning together with self-assessment and team-based continuous and individual questionnaire assessments to be valuable instructional methods that allowed higher student academic performance in comparison to the face-to-face academic student results. Furthermore, the academic performance was directly related to the student participation in both team-based and individual activities during the course, demonstrating that the adaptation of the face-to-face course to the e-learning environment was, at least, as efficient as the traditional course, despite student resistance to e-learning and e-assessment.

Nurses’ Knowledge of and Confidence in Perioperative Skills for Emergency Cesarean Birth

ObjectiveTo assess if nurses’ perioperative knowledge of and confidence in perioperative skills for emergency cesarean birth improved after didactic learning and high-fidelity simulation. DesignDescriptive, one-group pretest and posttest design. Setting/Local ProblemLevel 3 labor and birth unit that averages 3,000 births per year. At the site, there were no current evidence-based programs specifically focused on perioperative skills sustainment of the maternity nursing professional. ParticipantsRegistered nurses on a labor and birth unit with at least 1 year of experience completed an online educational course and simulation activity. Interventions/MeasurementsParticipants were given pretests and posttests to assess knowledge and confidence in emergency cesarean birth perioperative skills. Observations of nurses’ pretest and posttest interventions in cesarean births were made to assess changes in competency. Chart reviews were completed to assess changes in decision-to-incision time before and after the intervention. ResultsNurses reported greater confidence and knowledge during emergency cesarean birth after participating in the interventions. Other results included decreased decision-to-incision times. None of these results held statistical significance. ConclusionThis project highlights the need for evidence-based, standardized perioperative maternity education across labor and birth nursing practice.

Online education at the medical School of Tongji University during the COVID-19 pandemic: a cross-sectional study

BackgroundThe global reputation of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has led universities in China to conduct online teaching. However, the actual feedback from medical teachers and students regarding online education remains unclear.MethodsA prospective questionnaire survey examined the current opinions of online education from teachers and students at the Medical School of Tongji University.ResultsA total of 488 valid questionnaires were collected (223 males, 45.7%; 265 females, 54.3%), including 394 students (80.7%) and 94 teachers (19.3%). Most teachers and students were “in favor of online teaching,” had “positive views for online education,” were “satisfied with online teaching,” and “expected for regular online education,” although students thought that “too much learning tasks had been assigned” (90.4% teachers vs. 43.1% students, P < 0.001) and “less teaching effect than in offline classes” (68.1% teachers vs. 43.4% students). Compared to female counterpart, male students had higher “learning interest” (27.6% vs. 14.9%), “learning attention” (29.2% vs. 14.4%), “learning efficiency” (30.2% vs. 16.7%), and “better learning effect” (27.6% vs. 15.3%). Furthermore, male students had a significantly rise in attendance rate. Compared with male teachers, female teachers had less “experience in online educational course recording” (25.9% vs. 50%) and “past training for online teaching” (53.7% vs. 77.5%). Furthermore, they tended to be more “resistant to online teaching” (44.4% vs. 22.5%) and less “ready for online teaching” (70.4% vs. 87.5%). There was no significant difference in the acceptance of online teaching among teachers in different age groups.ConclusionsMost teachers and students supported and were satisfied with the implementation of online education during the pandemic. Although teachers were less adaptable to online education, they still had positive opinions. Sex influenced the acceptance of online teaching. Male teachers and students showed better adaptability than their female counterparts. Although online teaching has advantages, it still cannot completely replace traditional offline teaching. As online education is a trend for future learning, universities should make more efforts to improve it, especially to provide more attention to female teachers and students.

Usability Evaluation of E-textbooks by EFL Teachers

Electronic textbooks (e-textbooks) provide great convenience to teachers and students in both being activity-oriented and having more than one media in it. Especially during the COVID-19, e-textbooks have become much more important than any other time for the effective teaching of online courses. Therefore, many publishers rearranged e-textbook versions of their printed publications in Turkey. Regarding human-computer interaction, making the usability tests of these e-textbooks will give ideas to e-textbook content developers. Thus, three of these e-textbooks were carefully analysed for this research. They are the products of Kurmay, Speed Up and YDS publishing houses. The study was carried out with seven voluntary English teachers who teach 8th grades, work at the Ministry of Turkish National Education and have at least 3 years of teaching experience. Due to the pandemic, the sessions were held online by using the ‘Zoom Meetings’, which is an online meeting software. The usability was analysed according to effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction principles of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). At the end of the test, it was observed that the usability of Reading Alley and Marathon Plus e-textbooks were high and the usability of Speed Up was very high.

Supporting Student-Initiated Mobile Device Use in Online Learning

Understanding the experiences of students who self-initiate mobile device use for online courses or course-related activities provides institutions with valuable insights. In this study, we report how students enrolled in online courses in higher education voluntarily used mobile devices for their coursework and course-related activities, the challenges in using these devices, and how they managed those challenges. We surveyed 103 college students enrolled in one or more fully online courses regarding their habits in using mobile devices for online learning. Findings reveal most participants use mobile devices for convenience, portability, and overall ease of use. The way the devices are used for course-related activities varies, however, with reasons ranging from taking notes and reading course materials, to downloading those materials, communicating, socializing, and other purposes. Challenges when using these devices often relate to access issues and overall limitations of the technology. Yet, despite these limitations, some reported that, depending on the task, even though using a mobile device often took longer compared to a laptop or PC, the convenience of using it was a greater benefit. Participants were surveyed about their experiences prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, providing additional perspectives for possible future research focused on emergency circumstances to remote teaching or alternative forms of instruction. Additionally, this study provides a foundation of how and why students choose to use mobile devices for coursework and in what ways they may need support from their institutions related to their use.

On the Role of Online Courses in Higher Education during COVID-19 Pandemic

During the COVID-19 epidemic, online teaching began to flourish. This paper introduces the status quo of online courses in higher education China, the teaching methods under the epidemic, the advantages and disadvantages of online teaching, and how to make better use of online teaching in the future. Keywords: Online courses, teaching, COVID-19 epidemic.

Impact of implementing a Choosing Wisely educational intervention into clinical practice: The CW-SIMI study (a multicenter-controlled study)

To evaluate the impact of an educational intervention based on the Italian Society of Internal Medicine Choosing Wisely (CW-SIMI) recommendations. Multicenter, interventional, controlled study. Twenty-three acute-care hospital wards in Italy. 303 Physicians working in internal medicine wards. An online educational course. The rate of proton pump inhibitor (PPI) prescriptions, the number of days of central venous catheter (CVC) usage, and the duration of intravenous (IV) antibiotic prescriptions evaluated at one month (T1) and at six months (T2) after course completion. Patients admitted and discharged during a 30-day period before the educational intervention (T0, one year before T2) were considered the comparison group. A total of 232 physicians completed the course, while 71 did not attend the course. Data from 608, 662, and 555 patients were analyzed at T0, T1, and T2, respectively. The rate of PPI prescriptions declined at one month (RR: 0.67, 95% CI: 0.52-0.87, p=0.0005) and at six months (RR: 0.62, 95% CI: 0.46-0.84, p=0.003), and the number of days of CVC usage was reduced at six months (9.13 days at T0 vs. 5.52 days at T2, p=0.007). The duration of IV antibiotic prescriptions displayed a decreasing trend (7.94 days at T0 vs. 7.42 days at T2, p=0.081). A simple online educational intervention based on the CW-SIMI recommendations was associated with a clinically relevant reduction in the usage of PPIs and CVCs. Further studies are needed to confirm these findings and a possible benefit on patients' outcomes.

Engineering education amid a global pandemic

To investigate the impact of the sudden shift to online education triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic, a survey was conducted among international mechanical engineering students, specializing in manufacturing technology, at the TU Dortmund University. The surveyed students, were exposed to differently structured online courses from different institutes, as well as dynamic developments in each online course, over the semester and thus were able to effectively assess the pros and cons of the different teaching styles. To get the viewpoints of both the involved parties on how a successful online education course needs to be structured, a similar survey was also conducted among manufacturing engineering professors involved in Germany. The survey, a combination of Likert-scale and free-text questions, tackled the aspects of motivation to teach and learn, ensuring effective teaching and learning, and proper assessment of the learning outcomes in an online education system. The results show that both parties initially struggled with the transition, but later adapted quickly to the new style of online teaching that was inspired by the conventional flipped classroom concept. Certain structures and approaches to online teaching, such as pre-recorded lectures; interactive Q&A sessions; quizzes for self-assessment, are preferred by students and teachers alike. Aspects where the viewpoints differed could be explained by the difference in age and the experience in using digital equipment. A challenge specific to online engineering education is on offering laboratory experiences to students. Possible solutions such as virtual labs, remote labs and digital-live labs that aid in overcoming this challenge are presented. Finally, based on the survey results and the author experiences on digital laboratories, best practice guidelines are presented that will help the readers in the design and deployment of online engineering courses.

Maintaining Close Contact from a Distance: Digital Aikido Training under Covid-19 Conditions – Reflections and Lessons from an Online Martial Arts Course

This work explores, reports, and reflects on the teaching and learning aspects of online courses in aikido, a peaceful martial art, under COVID-19 lockdown conditions in Greece. The essay is based on research and auto-ethnographic accounts of the digital courses the authors of this text have set up as teachers of aikido during the pandemic. There is little research on pedagogic and didactic issues of designing online courses in martial arts or on outcomes of digital learning. Thus, the present text aims to explicate the theoretical background drawn from different scientific disciplines in designing an online course in a martial art. This course attempted to meet the challenge of teaching online an art that ‘normally’ is taught face to face, entailing physical practice in pairs. The essay explores and reflects also on the outcome of online learning under pandemic conditions. These are mostly social in nature, for the lessons and the contact strengthened the members in many ways. Thus, the ramifications of online teaching and learning are far reaching as they affect the participants and their families helping them to maintain a sense of wellbeing or normality under trying conditions. The social aspect of teaching a martial art online showcases its changing nature as well as its potential and possibilities for contributing to social cohesion, in the face of the grave dangers the current pandemic poses for humanity. It is an aspect of martial arts that could be taken into account when discussing their future in society.

From the Normal to the New Normal: Reflecting Metamorphosis in Pedagogies

The study aims to shed some light on pedagogical and learning issues that have cropped up during the pandemic for transitioning from traditional classrooms to entirely virtual learning. The study reflects how the paradigm shift can directly or indirectly affect the soft skills of all parties involved in the success or the failure of an educational system. An in-depth focus group discussion methodology was used to collect information in this qualitative study. Thirty faculty who taught online courses at the tertiary level were selected for the discussions. They provide significant insights about how the fully online learnings continued longer than the anticipated timelines impact the pedagogical value and the futurity of an individual’s educational goals. The study shows that embracing the virtual approach in teaching can promote teachers’ innovativeness by using various new applications and digital tools but bring new challenges for dealing with diverse learning styles.

Познавательный интерес как важнейший компонент внутренней мотивации обучающихся при проведении онлайн-занятий

The authors of the article conduct a study aimed at determining such parameters as the level of motivation, cognitive interest and attitude to the peculiarities of teaching the discipline and course management during online classes on the example of the discipline "Marketing". In the recital of the study presents the results of a survey of the level of motivation for success 144 students of 3rd and 4th year of secondary professional educational institutions, the results of the survey in terms of teaching and assessment online courses, as well as the relationship with the levels of cognitive interest of students. As a result of the study, problems with students ' motivation, feedback, timeliness of knowledge assessment and technical problems in the process of conducting online classes were identified.

Online Instructor Transformational Leadership and Student Engagement in Higher Education: A Literature Review

Transformational leadership offers a new theoretical framework to examine the correlation between online instructors and student engagement, a crucial indicator of students’ academic performance. This literature review sought to provide an updated picture of instructor transformational leadership and its impact upon student engagement in the context of higher education online courses in order that its readers can be informed of the relevant prior studies so far, which hopefully can inspire future research efforts regarding the topic in question. This review also justifies further investigation into the correlation between online instructor transformational leadership and student engagement.

The Use of Online Education by the Czech Population in the European Context

The article deals with online educational courses in the Czech Republic. The subject of the investigation is the participation of individuals between 16–74 years of age in online education in the Czech Republic and its development. The investigation also focuses on the computer skills of individuals and their development between 2005–2014, and also in 2017, depending on data availability. All the above-mentioned indicators were analysed and compared to the situation in the neighbouring countries and in the European context. The methods of analysis, synthesis and comparison were applied. The research showed that the number of individuals participating in courses in the Czech Republic was relatively low in comparison to other neighbouring countries, even though the advancement of computer skills in the Czech Republic was constantly increasing from 2005 to 2014.

Pedagogy vs. Technology: Challenges in Developing Online Courses in Social Work Education

ABSTRACT Similar to all academic disciplines, the use of information and communication technology (ICT) in social work has grown exponentially in both scope and volume during recent decades. Until the COVID 19 crisis, main driving forces were the growing demand for higher education, constant evolving of innovative technologies, cost effectiveness, and accessibility that it offers to those who are not able to benefit from traditional face to face classes because of their geographic locations, responsibilities or disabilities. The Covid19 pandemic drove social work education to become almost exclusively and universally taught online. This required a quick conversion of tradition courses and development of new courses to be taught online. This article discusses and illustrates issues, challenges and strategies related to the interaction between the faculty and technology experts in the context of developing online courses and points to directions for future research.

The Use of MOOCS in Online Engineering Education

The study demonstrates the possibilities of using massive open online courses in engineering education. In order to study the impact of digital learning formats on the acquisition of key engineering competencies by students, an educational experiment was carried out; it was performed as part of the study of the Fire Safety discipline on the basis of the online educational platform Khan Academy. Conceptually, the educational process was aimed at studying the capabilities of software in the field of fire safety, namely: PyroSim, Pathfinder, FireRisk, FIM, FireCategories, PromRisk, FireDistance, as well as gaining professional competencies in the process of performing practical tasks. The educational experiment involved third-year intramural and extramural students of the Faculty of Engineering (The Saint-Petersburg University of the State Fire Service of the EMERCOM of Russia) and Moscow City Pedagogical University. The online educational course was conducted with an emphasis on consolidation and acquisition of professional engineering knowledge and skills in the development of fire safety projects under simulated risk conditions using modern software and an innovative educational platform. The participants demonstrated a high level of involvement, initiative and professional aspirations in the learning process. In the context of the educational experiment, the key competencies required for 21st century engineers have been identified. The students confirmed the positive impact of digital pedagogical tools on the acquisition and development of key competencies necessary for further professional activity. Having completed an online course on the Khan Academy platform focused on the applied interaction with advanced software in the field of fire safety, students identified skills that should be developed and consolidated, namely: teamwork skills and the ability to work in multidisciplinary teams, the ability to manage projects (management, planning, scheduling, budgeting, etc.); the ability to define, formulate and solve engineering problems; the ability to effectively prioritize; striving for lifelong learning; willingness to take a calculated risk; ability to make professional decisions; self-regulation and self-motivation. However, the development of important engineering competencies such as high ethical standards, honesty and global social, intellectual and technological responsibility; good communication skills, high emotional intelligence and cognitive flexibility; entrepreneurial spirit and customer focus requires educators to search for different pedagogical methods and practices. The assessment of the impact of digital learning formats on the acquisition of key engineering competencies was subjective, but revealed pedagogical approaches to the qualitative development of engineering personnel. An effective combination of traditional classroom and virtual interactions can create a complex paradigm of high-quality engineering and technical education that is competitive in the market environment.

Strategies for innovative teaching and learning Part 2: How to deliver a distance education online course

The second article in a three-part series discusses how to deliver a distance education online course by i) assuring understanding of the learning platform, ii) developing a course model, iii) creating individual assignment rubrics for courses, iv) requiring active participation from both instructor and students, and v) setting-up quality communication. This paper is a continuation of the first paper whereby the history of distance learning, the positives and negatives of online learning, advantages and disadvantages of online learning, and the initial considerations for establishing online courses.