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An effective way of designing blended learning: A three phase design-based research approach

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Ahmet Berk Ustun at Bartin University
Ahmet Berk Ustun
Monica W. Tracey at Wayne State University
Monica W. Tracey
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Online learning is common in higher education, but has its drawbacks. As a result, blended learning (BL) has emerged as an alternative to alleviate the challenges of online learning. The purpose of this design-based research study was to determine what elements were needed to assist a higher education instructor inexperienced in designing and teaching a BL course to successfully create and implement it, and to document the instructor’s perceptions about the first experience of teaching a BL course. The BL course was designed, implemented and redesigned to make the BL course an effective and efficient learning environment through the three phases of this design-based research. Qualitative and quantitative research methods including instructor interviews, learning environment observations and student surveys were employed to collect data. Results indicated that iterative analysis, design and evaluation of the created BL course provided an opportunity for the researchers to find applicable solutions to any real-world problems that the instructor faced in the course. Besides, the design and implementation of BL led the instructor to shift from a passive teaching approach to an active teaching approach and allowed the students to become active and interactive learners through the process of three iterative design cycles. Although challenges were identified, she had an overall positive perception toward teaching the BL course.
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An effective way of designing blended learning:
A three phase design-based research approach
Ahmet Berk Ustun
1
&Monica Walch Tracey
2
Received: 7 May 2019 /Accepted: 13 August 2019
#Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2019
Abstract
Online learning is common in higher education, but has its drawbacks. As a
result, blended learning (BL) has emerged as an alternative to alleviate the
challenges of online learning. The purpose of this design-based research study
was to determine what elements were needed to assist a higher education
instructor inexperienced in designing and teaching a BL course to successfully
create and implement it, and to document the instructor’s perceptions about the
first experience of teaching a BL course. The BL course was designed, imple-
mented and redesigned to make the BL course an effective and efficient
learning environment through the three phases of this design-based research.
Qualitative and quantitative research methods including instructor interviews,
learning environment observations and student surveys were employed to col-
lect data. Results indicated that iterative analysis, design and evaluation of the
created BL course provided an opportunity for the researchers to find applicable
solutions to any real-world problems that the instructor faced in the course.
Besides, the design and implementation of BL led the instructor to shift from a
passive teaching approach to an active teaching approach and allowed the
students to become active and interactive learners through the process of three
iterative design cycles. Although challenges were identified, she had an overall
positive perception toward teaching the BL course.
Keywords Blended learning .Design-based research .Improving teaching and learning .
Higher education
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10639-019-09999-9
*Ahmet Berk Ustun
ustun.ab@gmail.com; abustun@bartin.edu.tr
Monica Walch Tracey
monicatracey@wayne.edu
1
Bartin University, Bartın, Turkey
2
Wayne State University, Detroit, MI, USA
Education and Information Technologies (2020) 25:1529–1552
/Published online: 20 August2019
Content courtesy of Springer Nature, terms of use apply. Rights reserved.
... He argued that their fear of change is a main barrier to its adoption. Something that could undermine their digital literacy skills (Ustun and Tracey, 2020), and in turn the quality of online education delivered as it depends primarily on teachers' technological competence (Bower et al., 2015). In other studies, lecturers named inadequate support, lagging technology infrastructure and poorly defined e-learning strategy by their institution as major hindrances to e-learning (Ustun, Tracey, 2020;Graham et al., 2013;Tamim, 2018). ...
... Something that could undermine their digital literacy skills (Ustun and Tracey, 2020), and in turn the quality of online education delivered as it depends primarily on teachers' technological competence (Bower et al., 2015). In other studies, lecturers named inadequate support, lagging technology infrastructure and poorly defined e-learning strategy by their institution as major hindrances to e-learning (Ustun, Tracey, 2020;Graham et al., 2013;Tamim, 2018). ...
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