Internet Learning Volume 3, Number 2, Fall 2014 | Page 57
Internet Learning
active, web-facilitated and/or blended classrooms
early in the semester so that their
teachers may intervene and address the specific
needs of potentially at-risk students in
interactive classrooms.
Conceptual Framework
The concepts that frame this study
are as follows: interactive teaching,
blended learning, self-efficacy,
and Peer Instruction. We describe our research-based
definitions of these concepts
below.
Interactive Teaching
The pedagogical approach in such
classrooms is generally based on constructivist
theories of learning: “the contemporary
view of learning…that people construct
new knowledge and understanding based
on what they already know” (Bransford,
Brown, & Cocking, 2000 p. 10). Interactive
teaching is a concept that lacks definitional
clarity in the higher education literature.
It is most often used in contrast to didactic,
lecture-based teaching and researchers
often attach the use of technology to conceptualizations
of interactive teaching (see
Sessoms, 2008). However, while there are
numerous examples of interactive teaching
that incorporate technology, there are just
as many that do not; rather than technology
serving as determinant in conceptualizations
of interactive teaching, we posit that it
is the pedagogical approach that is the most
salient, defining feature.
In a typical classroom where interactive
teaching is in use, an observer would
witness numerous discursive actions occurring
through multi-directional feedback
loops among students, teachers, and other
course staff. The pedagogical approach in
such classrooms is generally based on basic
constructivist theories of learning: “the
contemporary view of learning people…
that construct new knowledge and understanding
based on what they already know”
(Bransford, Brown, & Cocking, 2000 p. 10).
Prevailing constructivist views of learning
do not imply that “teachers should never
tell students directly, but instead should always
allow them to construct knowledge for
themselves” (Bransford, Brown, & Cocking,
p. 11), but rather that learning is a social and
cognitive process that depends on the prior
knowledge state of the student (Ambrose
et al., 2010; Bransford et al., 2000; Darling-Hammond,
Rosso, Austin, Orcutt, &
Martin, 2003; Piaget, Green, Ford, & Flamer,
1971; Vygotsky, 1998). Constructivists
also privilege the power of social learning
theory (Vygotsky, 1998), which emphasizes
the idea that “all learning…involves social
interactions” (Vygotsky, referenced in Darling-Hammond
et al., 2003).
Web-facilitated and Blended Learning
According to the report, Grade
Change-Tracking Online Education in
the United States (Allen & Seamen, 2014),
web-facilitated learning is typically “a course
that used web-based technology to facilitate
what is essential a face-to-face course.” An
online course is one where at least 80% of
the content is delivered online. The course
we studied for this research was a blended,
flipped classroom: “a course that blends online
and face-to-face delivery”, where between
30-79% of the content is delivered
online, and students do engage in continuous
learning before, during, and after class.
Self-efficacy
Theories of self-efficacy (Bandura,
1977, 2003) lay the groundwork for this
study. We define self-efficacy as the belief
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