Article
Instructional strategies and course design for teaching statistics online: perspectives from online students
International Journal of STEM Education
(2017)
Abstract
Background: Teaching online is a different experience from that of teaching in a face-to-face setting. Knowledge
and skills developed for teaching face-to-face classes are not adequate preparation for teaching online. It is even
more challenging to teach science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) courses completely online because
these courses usually require more hands-on activities and live demonstrations. Although the demand for online
STEM courses has never been higher, little has been done to develop effective instructional and online course
design strategies for teaching STEM courses online. This paper reports the effectiveness of the instructional strategies
adopted and the online course design features in a fully online statistics course from the students’ perspectives. The
online statistics course was an introductory, quantitative research course that covered common statistical concepts and
focused on the application of educational research concepts for graduate students in educational technology. In terms
of the statistics concepts covered, the course was similar to an introductory statistics class for students majoring in
science, technology, math and engineering (STEM). The participants were mostly K-20 (meaning from kindergarten to
college) instructors who had knowledge of instructional strategies.
Results: Data collected from participants’ reflections and course evaluations revealed that a range of
instructional strategies and course design features were effective and helped students learn statistics in an
online environment. Specifically, case studies, video demonstrations, instructor’s notes, mini projects, and
an online discussion forum were most effective. For online course design features, consistent structure,
various resources and learning activities, and the application focused course content were found to be
effective.
Conclusions: The implications of this study include effective instructional strategies and online course
design for application-oriented STEM courses such as physics and engineering. The study results can be
used to guide online teaching and learning as well as online course design for instructors, course
designers, and students in STEM fields.
Keywords
- Instructional strategies,
- Online course design,
- Online pedagogy,
- Statistics,
- Teaching STEM online,
- Educational research
Disciplines
Publication Date
Winter December, 2017
Citation Information
Dazhi Yang. "Instructional strategies and course design for teaching statistics online: perspectives from online students" International Journal of STEM Education (2017) Available at: http://works.bepress.com/dazhi_yang/47/