Continuous activity with immediate feedback: a good strategy to guarantee student engagement with the course

Abstract

This paper describes the experience of applying a new teaching strategy to a basic mathematics course at the Open University of Catalonia. This strategy requires students to engage with practice and assessment tests with automatic feedback. The main aim of this research is to look into the extent to which the key elements of this teaching strategy influence the students’ course completion and academic achievement. In order to achieve this purpose, qualitative and quantitative variables over one term have been measured weekly. Our findings suggest that this teaching strategy significantly reduced the number of students who dropped out and improved academic results. More specifically, regular practice activities at the beginning of the semester help to engage students in the completion of the course.

Keywords:

• online mathematics
• dropout rates
• active learning
• activity-centred environment
• engagement

Acknowledgements

The project described here was developed within the framework of a teaching innovation project granted by the Vice President for Research and Innovation at the UOC, carried out by an interdisciplinary team of lecturers and specialists in the development of technological tools for learning. The authors would like to express most sincere gratitude to Maths for More and the members of the university's Educational Technology Department for their excellent work, without which this project would not have been prospered.

In addition, the authors would like to thank the accepting co-editor Gill Kirkup as well as the anonymous referees for their careful review and valuable suggestions.

Notes

1.See www.uoc.edu

2.See www.wiris.com.