Teaching methods at Molde University College

Transcription

1 Teaching methods at Molde University College By Mikkel Eine Furuset Olger Pedersen Knut Olav Sørset Kristoffer Leon Nilsen 1

2 Executive summary This is report is based on a survey about teaching methods. We conducted the survey as a part of the course SCM300 Survey Design. We are a group of four students studying Logistics and Supply Chain management at Molde University College (HiMolde). The main purpose of our survey is to observe and analyze students preferences regarding teaching and working methods. Inspired by some literature and the teaching at HiMolde, we came up with six research questions. Based on these research questions, we made a digital quantitative survey, which we distributed mainly online, to students at HiMolde. The survey s sample size was 105. We have used both inferential and descriptive statistics for our analyses, which have led us to the following results. 1. The majority of the students perceive that their learning outcomes have increased by either much or very much with the use of himoldex.no and social media. 2. The majority of the students perceive that their learning outcomes have increased by either much or very much with the use of assignments, trainings sessions, course specific tasks and home exams. When it comes to preferences regarding individual or group work, the participants were divided. 3. We found no significant relationship between students genders and how much they perceived their learning outcomes have increased when they are required to do assignments. 4. In our analysis, we did not find any significant relationship between whether students have a job in addition to their studies and if they perceive their learning outcomes have increased when lectures are being recorded. 5. Students with jobs are not more likely to skip class when lectures are being recorded than students without jobs. 6. We found that older students prefer individual work as opposed to younger students who prefer group work. 2

3 Table of contents 1. INTRODUCTION LITERATURE REVIEW RESEARCH QUESTIONS AND HYPOTHESES METHODOLOGY CHOICE OF TOPIC DESIGN OF THE SURVEY DELIVERY OF THE SURVEY RESULTS AND DISCUSSION DESCRIPTION OF THE SAMPLE CHARACTERISTICS OF THE SAMPLE ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION Research question Research question Research question Research question Research question Research question CONCLUSION APPENDIX LIST OF REFERENCES ATTACHEMENT 1: Survey responses List of figures: Figure 1: Gender of respondents Figure 2: Age of respondents Figure 3: Part time and full time students Figure 4: Students with jobs Figure 5: Field of study Figure 6: Level of education Figure 7: Learning outcome and recorded lectures Figure 8: Learning outcome and short video lectures Figure 9: Learning outcome and communication through digital channels Figure 10: Skipping class and recorded lectures Figure 11: Learning outcome and assignments Figure 12: Perceived learning outcome and course specific tasks Figure 13: Preferred working methods Figure 14: Learning outcome and training sessions Figure 15: Learning outcome and home exam Figure 16: Assessments methods

4 List of tables: Table 1: Characteristics of the sample Table 2: RQ3 - Crosstab; Gender/assignments Table 3: RQ3 - Chi-Square test; Gender/assignments Table 4: RQ4 - Group statistics; Job/recorded lectures Table 5: RQ4 - Independent samples test; Job/recorded lectures Table 6: RQ5 - Group statistics; Job/skipping class Table 7: RQ4 - Independent samples test; Job/skipping class Table 8: RQ6 - Crosstab; age/individual or group work Table 9: RQ6 - Chi-Square test; age/individual or group work Acknowledgements First, we want to thanks all of our fellow students who participated in our survey. This gave us the chance to analyze and write a report about the students preferred working method and perceived learning outcomes with different teaching methods at HiMolde. We would also like to give special thanks to Judith Molka-Danielsen who guided us with much needed information regarding the setup of a rapport and its content and Katerina Shaton who helped us to accomplish our statistical analyses. 4

5 1. Introduction We are a group of four logistics students at Molde University College (HiMolde). Our group has conducted a survey about the chosen topic of teaching methods. We have done this as a part of the course SCM300 Survey Design. This report is based on the result of that survey. We feel that some of the innovative teaching at HiMolde challenges a traditional way of conducting teaching at the university level. For its unique platform (HiMoldeX) and its new ways of conducting teaching, HiMolde has gotten a lot of publicity in the regional and national news. Inspired by some of the innovative teaching at HiMolde, we wanted to see what kind of teaching methods the students perceive increases learning outcomes the most. The main purpose of our survey is to observe and analyze students preferences regarding teaching and working methods. We also wanted to investigate if there is any relationship between the students' backgrounds and their preferences regarding teaching and working methods. What we learned in the course survey design has formed the basis of our survey and rapport. We have analyzed these research questions: 1. If students perceive that their learning outcomes have increased with the use of himoldex.no and social media. 2. How students prefer to work in order to increase their learning outcome. 3. If there is any significant relationship between the students genders and how much they perceive their learning outcome is increased when they are required to do assignments. 4. If there is any significant relationship between whether students have a job in addition to their studies and if they perceive their learning outcome is increased when lectures are being recorded and posted on himoldex.no. 5. If there is a significant relationship between whether students have a job and how likely they are to skip class when the lectures are being recorded. 6. If there is any significant relationship between students ages and if they prefer individual or group work. We have chosen to structure the report as follows: In chapter two, we will present some literature on our subject. This literature review has assisted in forming a basis for our research questions. In the third chapter, we will explain our methodology, choice of the topic, design/delivery of the survey and analyses. After this, we will introduce the main part of this report: results and discussion. We will analyze data and test our hypotheses with SPSS Statistics. Later, we will present a conclusion with a summary of the findings in this project and our future recommendations. 5

6 2. Literature review Learning outcome can be defined as the specification of what a student should learn as the result of a period of specified and supported study. However, how well each individual student perceives they are learning depends highly on the different approaches to teaching used in a course and how the teacher chooses to facilitate the student s work. Each student has their own preference regarding both teaching and working methods. Of course this is a highly individual subject, but it seems like a lot of research and articles on this subject have a lot in common in their conclusions; traditional classroom lectures alone are not the most effective way of teaching. Edgar Dale s theory, Cone of learning, suggests that the least effective learning methods are some of the components often used in traditional classroom lectures, such as learning through passive information presented through verbal symbols. On the other hand, it suggests that the most effective learning methods involve hands-on learning activities (Dale et al., 1969). Even though this is an old and widely known theory, many courses still uses traditional classroom lectures with very little or none of the hands-on learning activities. In a research article named Enhancing the Classroom Learning Experience with Web Lectures (Day et al., 2004), they have looked at how to use web lectures instead of traditional classroom lectures to present the lecture material, and then use the in-class time for different learning activities. They state that learning sciences research tells us that students learn much better by doing rather than by listening. Even though their survey was too small to draw any real conclusions, their findings point in the direction that web lectures as a supplement to classroom lectures are a good thing both for students wanting to learn something and for teachers wanting to get more out of their time at work. In Effects of Innovative Teaching Strategies on Students Performance (Khursid et al., 2012), they wanted to uncover the effects of teaching techniques such as group discussions, computer assisted instructions, internet access, projects (both individual and in team) and a few others. They divided fifty students into two groups where one group was taught using the mentioned techniques and the other group was taught using a more traditional approach. Both of the groups were given a pre-test before the project started. After one month of teaching, they were given a post-test where the group that was instructed using modern teaching techniques achieved a significantly higher score. Digital Tilstand 2014 (Norgesuniversitetet, 2015), a survey for all Norwegian universities and university colleges with more than 500 students, looked at how to use digital teaching and learning tools. From the report, we can read that 9 out of 10 teachers still use traditional classroom lectures and only 4 of 10 believe that using digital tools in their teaching will increase the students learning outcome. On the other hand, 9 out of 10 students states that digital tools are important for their learning. Furthermore, half of the students did not perceive that their learning outcome would increase with digital methods 6

7 2.1 Research Questions and hypotheses 1) We want to find out if students perceive that their learning outcomes have increased with the use of himoldex.no and social media. 2) We want to find out how students prefer to work in order to increase their learning outcome. 3) We want to find out if there is any significant relationship between the students genders and how much they perceive their learning outcome is increased when they are required to do assignments. H0 3 There is no significant relationship between the genders and how much they perceive their learning outcome is increased when they are required to do assignments. H1 3 There is a significant relationship between the genders and how much they perceive their learning outcome is increased when they are required to do assignments. (H1; twotailed) 4) We want to find out if there is any significant relationship between whether students have a job in addition to their studies and if they perceive their learning outcome is increased when lectures are being recorded and posted on himoldex.no. H0 4 There is no significant relationship between whether students have a job in addition to their studies and if they perceive their learning outcome is increased when lectures are being recorded. H1 4 Students who have a job in addition to their studies perceive their learning outcome is more increased when lectures are recorded than students who do not have job. (H1; onetailed) 5) We want to find out if there is a significant relationship between whether students have a job and how likely they are to skip class when the lectures are being recorded. H0 5 There is no significant relationship between whether students have a job and how likely they are to skip class when lectures are recorded. H1 5 Students who have a job in addition to their studies are more likely to skip class when the lecture is recorded than students who do not have a job. (H1; one-tailed) 6) We want to find out if there is any significant relationship between students ages and if they prefer individual or group work. H0 6 There is no significant relationship between students ages and if they prefer individual or group work. H1 6 There is a significant relationship between students ages and if they prefer individual or group work. (H1; two-tailed) 7

8 3. Methodology 3.1 Choice of topic Today s world has been modernized on many fronts but the education system has been criticized for still using the same old teaching methods. HiMolde has been a true pioneer in this area (at least in Norwegian scale). When we first started studying at this school, the teaching methods in the courses were different from each other. In some courses, the teacher used extra teaching methods such as recordings of the lectures, short video lectures, training sessions and assignments, while others only used traditional classroom lectures. Last spring, one of our group members made a survey about teaching methods that he presented for the school board. This survey was made before we started with the course SCM300 and it had no questions about the background of respondents. Because of this, we wanted to make a survey about the same topic but improve it with more and better questions and conduct analysis of the results. 3.2 Design of the survey As a group, we decided to make a quantitative survey and we decided to use Questback to make an online questionnaire. The survey consisted of 18 questions, which were mostly multiple-choice questions where the response alternatives were standardized (so we could compare the results). We also made some open questions where the respondents had the opportunity to elaborate and come with suggestions for improvement of the teaching methods. These questions were optional for the respondents and have not been used in the statistical analyze like the rest of the data. We broke down the survey into three parts. In the first part, we told provided some general information about our group and the purpose of the survey. We also informed that their data is handled anonymously. In the second part, we asked questions about the student`s background. We asked them about gender, age, field of study, etc. We analyzed these answers in order to prove our hypotheses right or wrong. The third part is about which working methods students prefer and which teaching methods students perceive to increase their learning outcome. For example, we asked if they perceive that their learning outcome has increased if the course offered video lectures. 3.3 Delivery of the survey Before we published our survey, the group members handed out a pilot survey to three people each. Afterward, we asked if they understood the questions, which led to some minor changes before we published the survey. Our main way to deliver the survey was using Facebook. Since our group of participants should be students at Himolde, we sent the questionnaire to different course groups (like HiMolde - MAT100, which is a group for math-students at Himolde) with fellow students. Other ways we tried to reach our audience was giving them an IPad at school so they could finish the survey while being observed. The reason we chose Facebook as our main distribution method was that we reached a big audience and it was not very time consuming. Giving them an IPad, on the other hand, is very time consuming. 8

9 3.4 Analyses Since we were using an online questionnaire, it was easy to get the data directly to the computer for further analysis. We used SPSS Statistics and graphs from Questback to analyze the results and to test our hypotheses. 4. Results and discussion 4.1 Description of the sample At Himolde, there are 2498 students according to their website. We have aimed for bachelor and master degree students in all ages for our survey. This has given us a sample size of 105. There were 89 people who answered after we published the survey on Facebook and 16 who answered after we gave them an IPad. Since we mainly distributed the survey with hyperlink on the internet, potentially every student at the school could have taken the survey, but we do not know how many students actually saw our request for taking the survey online. If every student saw our request, we would have a response rate at 4.2% (105 / 2498). This shows that we only acquired a small number of the students. We have calculated the desired sample size for this survey to be 334. We have used a confidence level of 95% (z = 2), a margin of error of 5% (e = 0.05) and a normal distribution of 50% (p = 0.5) for our calculation. As our sample is smaller than the desired sample size, it is reasonable to believe that our results are not totally representative of the total population of students at the school. Desired sample size = z! p(1 p) e! 1 + ( z! p 1 p e! N ) = 2! 0.5(1 0.5) 0.05! 1 + ( 2! ! 2498 ) = 334 We have designed the questionnaire so that the respondents would get a warning if they did not fill it out correctly. Therefore, all of the 105 responses were correct. This gives us a rejection rate of 0% (0 / 105). However, this could be somewhat misleading because we do not know how many respondents did not finish the survey because of the warnings. 9

10 4.2 Characteristics of the sample Figure 1 shows the gender of respondents in this survey. Out of 105 respondents, 52% were male and 48% were females. This means that we have balanced survey concerning gender. Gender 47.6% Male 52.4% Female Figure 1: Gender of respondents Figure 2 shows the age of the participants. As expected in a survey for students, most of the respondents were in the younger age range. 67.6% were 24 years old or younger and 19% were between 25 and 29 years old. Only 13.4% of the respondents were 30 years or older, which gives us a poor foundation for any analysis based on the age of the students Age 100% 90% 80% 70% 67.6% Percent 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% 19.0% 4.8% 1.9% 6.7% 40 years or older years years years 24 years or younger Figure 2: Age of respondents 10

11 The following figure shows the distribution between full time and part time students. Only 7.6% of the respondents were part time students. As with age, we would have a poor foundation for any analysis based on whether students are study full time or part time. Part time and full time students 7.6% Full time student Part time student 92.4% Figure 3: Part time and full time students Figure 4 illustrates how many of the participants that have a have a job in addition to their studies. 59% answered yes when we asked them if they had a job, and 41% answered no. Students with jobs 41.0% Yes No 59.0% Figure 4: Students with jobs 11

12 Students who study logistics represent approximately half of the respondents in our survey, while about one fourth have business as their field of study. As you can see in Figure 5, we also got answers from a few students who study sports, information technology, social and political sciences and health sciences. 100% 90% 80% 70% Field of study Percent 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% 3.8% 4.8% 6.7% Sports Informatics (IT) Social and political sciences 53.3% 26.7% 4.8% Logistics Business Health sciences Figure 5: Field of study Referring to Figure 6, 88.6% if the respondents are currently studying for a bachelor degree and 11.4% are studying for a master degree. 11.4% Level of education Bachelor Master 88.6% Figure 6: Level of education The biggest limitations in our sample is in the respondent s ages, their field of study and whether they are part time or full time students. We have not succeeded in reaching as many older students as we wanted to, and it seems like logistic students are more willing to participate in our survey than the students from the other fields of study are. It would also be interesting have more responses from part-time students. 12

13 A great percent of our respondents are full time logistics students under 24 years, and it is likely to believe that their answers are not representative for all the other subgroups at the school. This is clearly a limitation to all our results. Table 1 sums up the characteristics of the sample. Table 1: Characteristics of the sample 4.3 Analysis and discussion Research question 1 We want to find out if students perceive that their learning outcomes have increased with the use of himoldex.no and social media. For this research question, we have used descriptive data only. We have looked at what the respondents have answered to the questions related to himoldex.no and social media. For the questions about how much they perceive their learning outcome is increased, they were given the response alternatives very much, much, little and very little. They could also answer that none of their courses have used himoldex.no or social media in the way we are asking for, and we would later remove those responses for our analysis since we are only interested in analyzing the choices to those who have experienced himoldex.no or social media in their courses. For our analysis, we have aggregated the responses in order to see what the majority has answered. We found it reasonable to aggregate the two most positive response alternatives, very much and much, which indicates that what we are asking if it is a good thing for the students learning outcome. The two most negative response alternatives, little and very little, indicate that what we are asking about does not have a significant effect on the students learning outcomes. We have also calculated the median response to each question regarding himoldex.no and social media. We asked the participants how much they perceive their learning outcome has increased in courses where lectures are recorded and posted on himoldex.no. Figure 7 illustrates the response to this question. Since 4.8% of our respondents have never taken a course that have recorded the lectures, a total of 82.9% of those who have experienced this perceive that this has increased their learning outcome by either much or very much (79 / 95.2). The median response for this question is much. 13

14 How much students perceive their learning outcomes have increased in the courses where the lecture are recorded and posted on himoldex.no Percent 100% 90% 80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% 41.9% 37.1% 11.4% Figure 7: Learning outcome and recorded lectures 4.8% 4.8% Very much Much Little Very Little None of my courses have or have had recordings of lecture As we can see in Figure 8, 44.8% of the students perceive their learning outcome increases by much when a course offers short video lectures as a supplement to classroom lectures. 74% of our respondents who have had a course which uses short video lectures as a supplement to classroom lectures perceive that it has increased their learning outcome by either much or very much (67.7 / 91.4). On this question, we calculated a median response of much. How much students perceive their learning outcome have increased in courses that offers short video lectures as a supplement to classroom lectures Percent 100% 90% 80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% 22.9% 44.8% 17.1% Figure 8: Learning outcome and short video lectures 6.7% 8.6% Very much Much Little Very little None of my courses have or have had this offer The following figure tells us that the majority of students think that their learning outcome increases when the course leader is available for questions through digital channels or social media. Taking those who have never had this offer in consideration, 82.3% perceive that this has increased their learning outcome by very much or much. (75.2 / 91.4). For this question, much was the median response again. 14

15 How much students perceive their learning outcome have increased in courses where the course leader were available for questions through digital channels or social media Percent 100% 90% 80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% 43.8% 31.4% 12.4% Very much Much Little Very little None of my courses have or have had this offer 3.8% Figure 9: Learning outcome and communication through digital channels 8.6% We also wanted to find out if students are more likely to skip class when the lectures are recorded. Referring to Figure 10, almost half of the respondents answered that they sometimes would skip class and two fifths of the respondents would never skip class. 8.6% answered that they would always skip class. In the following question, we asked those who answered always or sometimes to explain why. The most common answers among our respondents were that they skip class because of other appointments or meetings, they live outside of Molde, or they have a job. It seems like recordings of the lecture gives them flexibility to combine studies with work and various life situations. A great share of the respondents also answered that it is easier to concentrate when watching the lecture at home as opposed to be in class. This also gives them the ability to rewind if they missed something. If the lecture is recorded on video and posted on himoldex.no, are students more likely to skip class? 3.8% 8.6% Always 40.0% Sometimes Never 47.6% None of my courses have or have had recordings of lectures Figure 10: Skipping class and recorded lectures 15

16 The results from the survey tells us that a majority of the students perceive that their learning outcome increased either much or very much when a course uses himoldex.no. Recorded lectures will lead to some students skipping class, but according to their explanations, this seems to be for good reasons, which will actually help them learn better or manage their daily schedule better. The question where we asked about their perceived learning outcome when the teacher is available through digital channels or social media is not a good question for answering our research question. Digital channels does not only refer to social media; for example, it could also refer to Fronter. Therefore, it would not be right to conclude that students perceive their learning outcome increases with use of social media alone, but we can conclude that they perceive their learning outcome is increased when the teacher is available through digital channels or social media Research question 2 We want to find out how students prefer to work in order to increase their learning outcome. For this research question, we have used the same approach for our analysis as for the previous question. We have looked at what the respondents have answered on the questions related to working methods and assessment methods. Many courses requires that students do assignments, so we wanted to find out if students perceive that this increases their learning outcome. The results are presented in Figure 11. Only 1% answered that they have never participated in a course with this requirement, therefore a total of 82.7% of those have been required to do assignments perceive that this has increased their learning outcome by either much or very much (81.9 / 99). We have calculated the median response to be much. How much students perceive their learning outcomes have increased in the courses that required them to do assignments Percent 100% 90% 80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% 38.1% 43.8% 14.3% Figure 11: Learning outcome and assignments 2.9% 1.0% Very much Much Little Very little None of my courses have or have had this requirement 16

17 Figure 12 illustrates what the respondents answered when we asked them how much they perceive their learning outcome increases when the course leader makes tasks specific to the course with complete solutions. We can see from the graphs that a great majority of the respondents have answered much and very much. Taking into consideration that 6.7% have never had this offer, 85.7% perceive that this increases their learning outcome by much or very much (80 / 93.3) and the median response is much. 14.3% perceive that this has a little or very little positive impact on their learning outcome (13.3 / 93.3). How much students perceive their learning outcomes have increased in the courses where the tutor made tasks specific to the course with complete solutions Percent 100% 90% 80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% 39.0% 41.0% 11.4% Very much Much Little Very little None of my courses have or have had this offer 1.9% Figure 12: Perceived learning outcome and course specific tasks 6.7% We thought it would be interesting to see if the students prefer individual work or group. The answers we got were very balanced, as illustrated in Figure 13, with a slight majority of 55.2% preferring individual work and the remaining 44.8% choosing group work as their preferred working method. Preferred working methods 55.2% 44.8% Group work Individual work Figure 13: Preferred working methods 17

18 In Figure 14 you can see the responses when we asked our participants how much they perceive their learning outcomes have increased in courses that offers training sessions with guidance. 4.8% have never had this offer. When aggregating the answers, we can see that 87.1% of those who have had this offer perceive that this has increased their learning outcome by much or very much (82.9 / 95.2). We calculated the median response for this question to be much. How much students perceive their learning outcomes have increased in courses that offers training sessions with the course leader and/or teaching assistant Percent 100% 90% 80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% 40.0% 42.9% 8.6% Figure 14: Learning outcome and training sessions 3.8% 4.8% Very much Much Little Very little None of my courses have or have had this offer Figure 15 shows us the responses when we asked how much the participants perceive their learning outcomes have increased in courses that have used home exams as the assessment method. We thought this could be a suitable question since home exams force the students to work in a different way than with traditional written school exams. Since one third of our respondents have never had this assessment method, we can say that 64.2% of those who have had a home exam perceive that their learning outcome has increased by very much or much (42,8 / 66,6) and the median response for these are much. How much students perceive their learning outcomes have increased in the courses that have had a home exam 100% 90% 80% 70% Percent 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% 33.3% 25.7% 17.1% 19.0% 4.8% Very much Little None of my courses have or have had ho Figure 15: Learning outcome and home exam 18

19 We also asked with which assessment methods they feel that they are able to show their knowledge the most. 34.3% answered written home exam, 29.5% answered project work, 27.6% answered written school exam and only 8.6% believes that oral school exams are the assessment method where they feel they are able to show their knowledge the most. With what kind of assessment method do students feel that you are able to show your knowledge the most? 29.5% 27.6% Written school exam Oral school exam Written home exam Project work 8.6% 34.3% Figure 16: Assessments methods The results in our survey shows that students perceive their learning outcome is increased either by much or very much when they are required to complete assignments, when the course leader makes course specific tasks with complete solutions and when courses have training sessions with the course leader or teaching assistants. The majority of those who have had home exams perceive that this has increased their learning outcome by much or very much, but our respondents are divided in their opinions about which assessment methods they feel are the best. Oral exam is clearly a method that our participants do not feel are good for their ability to show their knowledge, but the three other assessment methods we asked about got approximately one third of the responses each. In our survey, we have asked about specific working methods. Therefore, we have not really managed to find out how students prefer to work in order to increase their learning outcome, but we have found out which of the working methods we asked about they prefer. To get a better answer to our research question, we should have provided more types of working methods or we could have included some open questions so the respondents could tell us with their own words how they prefer to work. 19

20 4.3.3 Research question 3 H0 3 There is no significant relationship between the genders and how much they perceive their learning outcome is increased when they are required to do assignments. H1 3 There is a significant relationship between the genders and how much they perceive their learning outcome is increased when they are required to do assignments. (H1; twotailed) In research question number two we found that most students, 82.7%, perceive that their learning outcomes have increased in courses where they are required to do assignments. This hypothesis observes if there is a relationship between students gender and how much they perceive their learning outcomes have increased by that requirement. Since we are comparing a nominal variable (gender) and an ordinal variable (the perceived learning outcome), we have used a crosstab and a chi-square test for our statistical analyses. With the crosstab, we can easily compare observed and expected values for the two subgroups (males; females). The chi-square test helps us decide if the difference between the observed and expected values is significant. 1 out of 105 respondents answered that he or she has never participated in a course where assignments were required. We only analyzed those who have had this requirement, and therefore our sample size for this analysis was 104. From Table 2, we can read that 17 men (expected value: 20.8) and 23 women (expected value: 19.2) perceive their learning outcome is increased by very much when they are required to do assignments, and 28 men (expected value: 23.9) and 18 women (expected value: 22.1) answered much. This gives us 46 out 54 men and 41 out of 50 women who perceive that their learning outcome is increased by much or very much. At this point, we can already state that both genders perceive almost the same increase in their learning outcome. This will mean that we have to reject our H1 hypothesis. When performing a chi-square test (Table 3) we got a Pearson chi-square significance of (or 34.4%), which means that the difference between observed and expected values are not significant as it is exceeding 5%. Therefore, we can accept the H0 hypothesis: There is no significant relationship between the genders and how much they perceive their learning outcome is increased when they are required to do assignments. 20

21 Gender: *How much do you perceive your learning outcomes have increased in the courses that required you to do assignments? Crosstabulation How much do you perceive your learning outcome has increased in the courses that required that you do assignments? Those who Those who answered Those who answered "Much" on answered "Very Little" Very much Q13 "Little" on Q13 on Q13 Total Gender: Male Count Expected Count 20,8 23,9 7,8 1,6 54,0 Female Count Expected Count 19,2 22,1 7,2 1,4 50,0 Total Count Expected Count 40,0 46,0 15,0 3,0 104,0 Table 2: RQ3 - Crosstab; Gender/assignments Chi-Square Tests Value Df Asymp. Sig. (2- sided) Pearson Chi-Square 3,325 a 3,344 Likelihood Ratio 3,347 3,341 Linear-by-Linear Association,933 1,334 N of Valid Cases 104 a. 2 cells (25,0%) have expected count less than 5. The minimum expected count is 1,44. : Table 3: RQ3 - Chi-Square test; Gender/assignments 21

22 4.3.4 Research question 4 H0 4 There is no significant relationship between whether students have a job in addition to their studies and if they perceive their learning outcome is increased when lectures are being recorded. H1 4 Students who have a job in addition to their studies more often perceive their learning outcome is increased when lectures are recorded than students who do not have job. (H1; onetailed) With this hypothesis, we want to investigate the relationship between whether students have a job and how much they feel that recorded lectures help them increase their learning outcome. We found it was reasonable to think that those students who have a job would appreciate that lectures were recorded more than those who do not have a job since it gives them more flexibility when it comes to planning work schedules or taking extra shifts. It could also be the case that those who have a job do not mind the recorded lectures at all because they don t have time to watch them anyway. Since 59% of the respondents had a job in addition to their studies and 41% did not have a job, we have a good sample for this analysis. We have used an independent samples t-test and compared the means for the two subgroups (Students with a job; Students without a job) to prove our H1 hypothesis either wrong or right. 5 respondents have never attended a course where the lectures were recorded and posted on himoldex.no, and since we are only interested in the respondents who have experienced that, we have a sample size of 100 in our analysis for this hypothesis. In SPSS, the response alternative very much has the value 1 and the respond alternative very little has the value 4. The mean for students with a job is 1.75 (somewhere between very much and much ) and the mean for students without a job is 1.81 (somewhere between very much and much, but a little bit closer to much ). This tells us that the difference between the groups is very little and there is probably not a significant relationship between their perceived learning outcomes. This is also supported by our t-value in the test that we did, , which is close to zero but indicates that the first group (students with a job) has slightly lower mean value. The two-tailed significance value of (or 73%) tells us that there is no significant relationship between the variables. The students who have a job do not perceive their learning outcome is more increased when lectures are recorded than the students without a job do. Therefore we have to reject our H1 hypothesis and accept our H0 hypothesis: There is no significant relationship between whether students have a job in addition to their studies and if they perceive their learning outcome is increased when lectures are being recorded. 22

23 Do you have a job in addition Group Statistics to your studies? N Mean Std. Deviation Std. Error Mean How much do you perceive your learning outcome has increased in the courses where the lecture are recorded and posted on himoldex.no? Students with a job 57 1,75,892,118 Students without a job 43 1,81,794,121 Table 4: RQ4 - Group statistics; Job/recorded lectures Independent Samples Test Levene's Test for Equality of Variances t-test for Equality of Means How much do you perceive your learning outcome has increased in the courses where the lectures are recorded and posted on himoldex.no? F Sig. t Df Sig. (2- tailed) Mean Differen ce Std. Error Differen ce 95% Confidence Interval of the Difference Lower Upper Equal variances assumed 1,836,178 -,346 98,730 -,060,172 -,401,282 Equal variances not assumed -,352 95,2 56,726 -,060,169 -,396,276 Table 5: RQ4 - Independent samples test; Job/recorded lectures 23

24 4.3.5 Research question 5 H0 5 There is no significant relationship between whether students have a job and how likely they are to skip a class when lectures are recorded. H1 5 Students who have a job in addition to their studies are more likely to skip class when the lecture is recorded than students who do not have a job. (H1; one-tailed) This hypothesis will focus on how likely students are to skip class when the lectures are recorded and posted on himoldex.no. We assumed that students with a job would skip class more often than students who do not have job since it gives them the opportunity to work and still see lecture afterward. Of course, it could also be that students with a job do not skip class because they do not have time to watch lectures in the evening. To prove if our H1 hypothesis is either wrong or right, we used an independent samples test and compared means for the two groups (students with a job; students without a job) like we did for the previous hypothesis. 4 out of 105 respondents answered that they haven t attended a course where the lectures were recorded and posted on himoldex.no, which is weird since 5 respondents answered that on the last question. This could be a source of some minor error in our analysis. We should mention that they were given 3 response alternatives for how often they would skip class, where Always has the value 1, Sometimes has the value 2 and Never has the value 3. If the H1 hypothesis is correct, the mean of the students with a job would be closer to 1 than the mean of the students without a job. Comparing the means between the two groups, we can see that students with a job have a mean of 2.26 (between sometimes and never ) and the students who do not have a job have a mean of 2.42 (between sometimes and never as well, but slightly closer to never ). Students with a job do have a lower mean, but the difference between these groups is very small. The same observation can be done when looking at the t-value in the independent samples test. The t-value is and tells us that the mean of the first group (students with a job) is lower than the mean for the second group (students without a job). The independent samples test gave us a two-tailed significance of (or 21.2%), which exceeded 5%, meaning that there is no significant relationship between whether students have a job and if they are more likely to skip class when lectures are recorded and posted on himoldex.no. Therefore we have to reject our H1 hypothesis once again. 24

25 Do you have a job in addition Group Statistics to your studies? N Mean Std. Deviation Std. Error Mean If the lecture is recorded on video and posted on himoldex.no, are you more likely to skip class? Students with a job 58 2,26,609,080 Students without a job 43 2,42,663,101 Table 6: RQ5 - Group statistics; Job/skipping class Independent Samples Test Levene's Test for Equality of Variances t-test for Equality of Means 95% Confidence Interval of the If the lecture is recorded on video and posted on himoldex.no, are you more likely to skip class? F Sig. t df Sig. (2- tailed) Mean Differenc e Std. Error Differenc e Difference Lower Upper Equal variances assumed 1,857,176-1,257 99,212 -,160,127 -,412,093 Equal variances not assumed -1,241 86,1 12,218 -,160,129 -,416,096 Table 7: RQ4 - Independent samples test; Job/skipping class Research question 6 H0 6 There is no significant relationship between students age and if they prefer individual or group work. H1 6 There is a significant relationship between students age and if they prefer individual or group work. (H1; two-tailed) 25

26 This hypothesis observes if there is a significant relationship between students age and if they prefer individual or group work. Here we are comparing two nominal variables (age; individual or group work). Therefore, we found it reasonable to use a crosstab in connection with a chi-square test for our analysis. Table 9 shows a Pearson Chi-square value of (or 1.7%), meaning that the differences between the observed and expected values are significant. We can now accept the H1 hypothesis: There is a significant relationship between students ages and if they prefer individual or group work. When comparing expected and observed values, we can see that the youngest age range, 24 years or younger, is the only group who have a higher observed value than expected value for group work, and for all the other groups the observed values for individual work exceed the expected ones. For example, zero respondents over 40 years prefer group work (expected value: 2.2). We can see the same for respondents between 35 and 39 years (expected value: 0.9). 6 out of 7 respondents between 30 and 34 years prefer individual work (expected value: 3.9). The respondents between 25 and 29 years have answered closer to the expected value, but still the majority of 13 prefer individual work (expected value: 11). We have already accepted the H1 hypothesis, and we can now draw the assumption that older students tend to prefer individual work as opposed to group work. The groups of 40 years or older, years and years consist of 5, 2 and 7 respondents respectively. Therefore, it is doubtful that they are totally representative of their groups. The group of 24 years or younger is by far bigger than the other groups, with 71 respondents. 20 respondents were between 25 and 29 years. We have a weak foundation for our analysis because of the lack of respondents in the older age ranges. It could also be that people who decide to start studying for a bachelor or master degree when they have passed 30 years are more likely to be an individualist than those who follow the mainstream and start their studies when they are around 20 years old. Our result (older students prefer individual work) may therefore not be accurate. It is reasonable to question the significance presented in the analysis to this research question. Age: Which of these working methods do you prefer the most? Crosstabulation Which of these working methods do you prefer the most? Group work Individual work Total Age: 40 years or older Count Expected Count 2,2 2,8 5, years Count

27 Expected Count,9 1,1 2, years Count Expected Count 3,1 3,9 7, years Count Expected Count 9,0 11,0 20,0 24 years or younger Count Expected Count 31,8 39,2 71,0 Total Count Expected Count 47,0 58,0 105,0 Table 8: RQ6 - Crosstab; age/individual or group work Chi-Square Tests Value df Asymp. Sig. (2- sided) Pearson Chi-Square 12,041 a 4,017 Likelihood Ratio 15,031 4,005 Linear-by-Linear Association 11,434 1,001 N of Valid Cases 105 a. 6 cells (60,0%) have expected count less than 5. The minimum expected count is 90. Table 9: RQ6 - Chi-Square test; age/individual or group work 27

28 5. Conclusion The main purpose of our survey was to observe students preferences regarding teaching methods. To some extent we feel that we have managed this, but with some limitations. According to our calculations, we had too small of a sample size and too little variation among our sample, especially when it comes to age and field of study. This means that our survey may not be totally representative for all the students. To solve this problem, we could have spent more time using the IPad to deliver the survey to potential participants. We could also have used other delivery methods in addition to Facebook and IPad. We only checked the students preferences regarding the teaching and working methods that we asked them. There could be a lot of other relevant teaching and working methods that we did not think of putting in our survey. It is also difficult to measure learning outcomes. That is why we specifically asked the students about their perceived learning outcome. However, what the students perceive is their learning outcome may not be the same as what their actually learning outcome is. Based on the results from the survey from last spring, we expected that students would generally be positive to himoldex.no and use of social media. This has been confirmed with this survey. This is a contrast to the results from Digital Tilstand 2014 (page 11), where half of the students did not perceive that their learning outcome would increase with digital methods. This could mean that HiMolde has implemented digital teaching methods in a good way. When we asked the students about how much they perceived their learning outcome increases with assignments, trainings sessions, course specific tasks and home exams, the majority of the students perceived that their learning outcome has increased by much or very much with all these working methods. This was as expected. When it comes to preferences regarding individual or group work, the participants were divided. We found no significant relationship between the students genders and how much they perceive their learning outcome is increased when they are required to do assignments. However, we can conclude that the majority of both genders feel that their learning outcome increases when they are required to do assignments. In our analysis, we did not find any significant relationship between whether students have a job in addition to their studies and if they perceive their learning outcome is increased when lectures are being recorded. We expected that students with a job would perceive a bigger increase in their learning outcome than students without a job. It seems like the majority of all the students believe that video lectures help them, regardless of their working situation. 28

29 Students with jobs are not more likely to skip class when lectures are being recorded than students without jobs. We assumed that students with a job would skip class more often than students who do not have job. Based on our results, we believe most of the students try to see the lectures live. We found that older students prefer individual work as opposed to younger students, who prefer group work. It is worth mentioning that we have a weak foundation for our analysis because of the lack of respondents in the older age ranges. Still, if we choose to believe our results then it shows that younger students are more open for interactive learning. This makes focus on new learning methods an even more important topic. Our main conclusion is that the students perceive their learning outcomes have increased with all of the teaching and working methods we have asked about in our survey. This shows that there is a great potential in improving teaching methods in higher education. Therefore, we mean that further analyses should be done on the subject with a bigger and more varied respondent group. Furthermore, we mean that the school has to expand their use of digital teaching methods like himoldex.no and use of social media. We also believe that the school has to facilitate training sessions and follow up with the students closely. In the end, we want to say that we perceive that our learning outcomes have increased by working with this assignment. 29

30 6. Appendix - print preview , Survey on teaching methods. We are a group of students from Molde University College (SCM300 Survey Design). With this short questionnaire we would like to analyze which teaching methods students perceive increases their learning outcome the most. Your data will be used for internal purposes only. Your identity will be hidden. Read more about confidentiality and hidden identity here. (Opens in a new window.) 1) * Gender: Male Female 2) * Age: 40 years or older years years years 24 years or younger 3) * Are you a full time or part time student? Full time student Part time student 4) * Do you have a job in addition to your studies? Yes No 5) * What is your field of study? Sports Informatics (IT) Social and political sciences Side 1 av 3 30