Facilitation of web-based internet PBL: What is an adequate group size?
International e-Journal of Science, Medicine and Education
; : 4-11, 2014.
Article
in English
| WPRIM (Western Pacific)
| ID: wpr-629370
Responsible library:
WPRO
ABSTRACT
Background:
Development in internet technology enables e-learning at the higher education level. We have developed the Internet PBL-Tutorial System/Rakuichi that allows multi-directional communication among participants with web-based bulletin boards. Although this system has been successful in medical education at the undergraduate level, we sought to encourage “readonly members” to participate more fully in the program.Methods:
To this end, we compared the posting frequency among three strategies (1) students and tutors had an off-site meeting to promote face-to-face communication during the course, (2) several classes were allowed to watch the discussion in other classes in the second half of the course, (3) three classes (5 – 6 students each) in one topic were combined into one class (16 students) in the second half.Results:
No meaningful effects were observed for strategies (1) or (2). However, the posting frequency increased 50 % for strategy (3).Conclusion:
Facilitation of communication among participants was achieved by increasing the number of student participants. We predicted that an optimal number of students in each class in internet-based PBL would be ~20 people.
Full text:
Available
Database:
WPRIM (Western Pacific)
Type of study:
Qualitative research
Language:
English
Journal:
International e-Journal of Science, Medicine and Education
Year:
2014
Document type:
Article