Student engagement has been shown to positively influence student success (Kahu & Nelson, 2018). Yet students enrolled in a compulsory Primary Health Care (PHC) course in an undergraduate nursing education program, have shown limited engagement with blended learning using the learning management system Moodle. Student engagement is defined by NSSE (2018) as the amount of time and effort students put into their studies. Use of the Moodle classroom was encouraged by academic staff, but participation was optional and no grades were assigned for engagement. Feedback from nursing students in 2018 highlighted their lack of motivation for engaging with the Moodle classroom.
Motivating students to engage in online learning can be a challenge (Amandu, Muliira, Fronda, 2013). Research on online learning suggests that asynchronous discussion boards can be a successful method to increase student engagement (Osborne, Byrne, Massey, & Johnston, 2018). Establishing a teaching presence was identified by Luo and Kalman (2018) as crucial for student success. Peer learning activities have been found to encourage student participation with course content (Raymond, Jacob, Jacob & Lyons, 2016). Students however remain motivated primarily by grades (Luo & Kalman, 2018; Osborne et al., 2018). A Quality Improvement (QI) project, as part of an MSN capstone course for the project lead, will be implemented to translate research on student engagement into the PHC course Moodle classroom.
Purpose:
This QI project aims to increase the level of engagement demonstrated by undergraduate nursing students enrolled in a compulsory blended learning course on PHC nursing. At least 95% of students will complete the requirements for the course on PHC with a demonstrated understanding of key course concepts, as evidenced by achieving a passing grade (50%) in both the multiple choice and each of the long answer questions in their end of course exam.
Methods:
The Plan-Do-Study-Act cycle will be utilised in the introduction of a graded weekly activity to the Moodle classroom during five of the six theory weeks in the PHC course offered from July - November 2019. Moodle reports of enrolled students’ activity will be analyzed each week during the PDSA cycle. The analysis will include the number of students accessing Moodle, the frequency of student views and types of resources viewed. The results will be compared with baseline data collected from student activity reports for the semester July - October 2018.
Results:
The poster will display analysis of data yet to be obtained from Moodle activity reports from July - November 2019. Students’ perceptions of the effectiveness of Moodle contributing to their understanding of course content, will be obtained by an anonymous survey collected during week two of the semester in July 2019 and again at the end of the semester in November 2019. This will be compared with the NSSE 2018 results of the contribution of technology to understanding course content.
Conclusion:
This capstone project poster will provide guidance to nurse educators when choosing initiatives to increase undergraduate student engagement with blended learning in order to support student success.