Blended Learning Assessment

Overview

In Spring 2022, Simon Fraser University (SFU) launched a pilot of blended courses to support flexible education. As defined by the university, “Blended courses at SFU have at least one quarter and no more than three quarters of student learning integral to the course occurring in the online environment, replacing in person instruction.” A total of 110 blended courses were offered in 2022. 

Blended learning, and particularly the impact of blended course delivery on student learning, has been investigated across two terms:

• Spring 2022: Pre-course survey of blended learning instructors, a post-course survey of instructors, students and TAs involved in blended learning, and analysis of Student Experience of Teaching and Course (SETC) surveys.
• Fall 2022: Interviews with instructors and TAs who taught blended learning courses, content analysis of course outlines and analysis of Course Experience Surveys (CES).

The main findings were:

• Students expressed generally positive experiences with blended learning, with 47% reporting that they would take another blended course in future and a further 42% indicating that a course being blended would not impact their decision to take a course.
• Students pointed to flexibility as the key benefit of blended learning as it:
  • allowed them to save time and money on their commute to campus.
  • enabled them to set their own schedule, which could in turn allow them to take other courses.
  • allowed them to keep up with their courses by continuing the online component when they were unable to attend in-person.
  • enhanced accessibility for neurodivergent students.
• Challenges students reported included:
  • socializing and developing supportive relationships with peers in their class.
  • reduced time to interact with the course instructors face-to-face.
  • keeping up the pace with the expectations in the course; amount of work required (i.e. readings, assignments) was larger than they expected.
• Instructors and TAs echoed the benefits of flexibility for students, and outlined how the variety of learning activities in blended courses allowed for a rewarding learning experience.
• Issues related to the delivery of blended course include:
  • diverse range of course delivery models provided under blended courses
  • logistical roadblocks to teaching blended courses
  • shifting student expectations of the teaching team
  • workload management - note: Workload management challenges came up under different contexts for each stakeholder group. Instructors noticed that some students were not able to keep-up with the course expectations, while 20-25% of students felt the workload of the course was more than expected or heavy. TAs commented on how they were being asked to grade shorter, more frequent assignments – leading to some students falling behind.

For more information, please refer to the full reports below.