1. Blended Introductory Physics Course for Science Programs: Instructor’s Experience of NCAT Redesign
Tetyana Antimirova
Department of Physics
Faculty of Science
Ryerson University
Toronto, Canada
Canadian Association of Physicists Congress
May 29-June 2, 2017
Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario
This talk describes a course coordinator/instructor’s experience of a course redesign following one of the National Council for Academic Transformation (NCAT) models.

2.
Calculus-based introductory physics course for science programs (offered since 2005)
Mechanics (3/4) + Electrostatics (1/4)
Includes students in life sciences, physical sciences and mathematics
500+
3 “lecture” hours per week
2 lab hours every other week
2 tutorial hours every other week
This course is typically taught in two or three parallel lecture sections
All lecture sections share the same syllabus, common mandatory labs and tutorials, and a common grading scheme for all evaluations.

3. Challenges
On average, about 30% of students do not have grade 12 physics experience
The course had low retention and low successful completion rates
Students’ preparedness for the upper year courses
(knowledge retention)
We already tried various measures to turn the class into a more active learning environment. In particular, we have been using clickers to collect student responses since 2006 and the MasteringPhysics online platform since At the time of the NCAT redesign proposal we were at the final stages of the data analysis for the project commissioned by the Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario (HEQCO) . The report [3] is available at The project was designed to evaluate the effectiveness of the selected large-class teaching strategies as a part of HEQCO initiative on improvement teaching and learning in large classes. These changes, already implemented before NCAT redesign, were in line with the evidence-based best practices in science teaching. Those practices proved to be effective in many different settings, and we have evidence that they worked in our classes as well [3-5]. Therefore, we had solid evidence that our previous work on improving the course already lead to better learning outcomes, better course retention and better grades for those students who completed the course. We intended to build upon this success in our NCAT course redesign. We believed that we could make further significant improvements, in particular, in the area of quality of student learning and adequately preparing the students for their upper year physics courses. Finally, there was a team of enthusiastic instructors willing to invest their time and efforts in this course redesign.

4. Motivation for Course Redesign
Requires extensive human resources, as well as the space and equipment requirements and constraints
To deal with continuous increase in introductory science class sizes for science, pre-medical and engineering programs
To improve the retention and completion rates
To improve the quality of student learning and preparedness for upper year courses
The course had been a work in progress, with small incremental improvements

5. What is NCAT?
National Council for Academic Transformation (NCAT) ) is an independent, non-profit US-based organization that “provides leadership in using information technology to redesign learning environments to produce better learning outcomes for students at a reduced cost to the institution”.
The NCAT staff includes faculty members, administrators and researchers with extensive experience in higher education.

6. NCAT Course Redesign Key Elements
NCAT identifies eight main elements of successful course redesign:
establishing greater course consistency through the whole course redesign
requiring active learning
increasing interaction among students
providing regular assessment and prompt (ideally, automated) feedback
providing students with one-on-one individualized, on- demand assistance from qualified personnel
allowing differentiated learning and sufficient time on task
thoroughly monitoring student progress and intervening when necessary
measuring learning, completion, and cost

7. Ryerson Courses Redesign
In 2014 Ryerson University applied for and received funding from the government of Ontario to carry out a pilot course redesign project
Funded through a Productivity and Innovation Fund (PIF) grant
Two goals were simultaneously pursued in this project:
1) improving student learning outcomes
2) improving the institution’s capacity to deliver enhanced educational experience efficiently (i.e., productivity improvement)

8. Ryerson Courses Redesign
Fourteen courses across different faculties were selected for the pilot on course redesign
Represented science, engineering, business and community service courses
The courses redesign followed the NCAT guidelines
The large-enrollment introductory physics course for science program majors was among the fourteen courses selected for the pilot

9. The Supplemental Model
The changes in our course can be characterized best as the supplemental model of NCAT
The Supplemental Model
retains the basic structure of the traditional course
and
a) supplements lectures and textbooks with technology-
based, out-of-class activities
and/or
b) changes what goes on in the class by creating an active learning environment within a large lecture hall setting“.
In our case, both features a) and b) were present

10. Course Before the Redesign
Lectures with Peer Instruction supported by clickers
Mandatory home homework offered through “Mastering Physics” platform
Labs
Tutorials
However, we still retained the large lecture setting with the lectures that could be best characterized as the elements of modified Peer Instruction [6, 7] and Just-in-Time Teaching [8]. The Peer Instruction pedagogy was pioneered a couple decades ago by Eric Mazur [6, 7]. It is now widely adopted in science teaching and beyond. Our students were required to read a textbook before class and answer a short pre-lecture online quiz covering the material of the assigned pre-lecture reading. During class time we packed conceptual material in short lecture segments that were followed by the small-group discussions of the examples, and questions to the class. The students’ responses to the questions were collected with personal response systems (clickers), which provide immediate feedback to both the students and the instructor. We continued to move further away from traditional lectures and closer toward a flipped classroom environment. In addition to the previously implemented pre-lecture textbook reading, we required the students to watch video vignettes and mini-lesson targeting topics and concepts that are known to be particularly difficult to students. All the materials were made available either through the course management system (Blackboard) or through the MasteringPhysics student resources page.
Since the students were expected to familiarize themselves with the new material before coming to class, the class time was shifted to include less didactic lecturing. Instead, more time was spent on the difficult aspects of the material being covered using Peer Instructions with clickers, small discussion groups, working on examples and answering common students’ questions.
Following a Just-in-Time Teaching approach, students were encouraged to send their questions to the instructor after finishing the assigned reading and prior to the lecture. Unfortunately, relatively few students took this opportunity.

11. Course Modifications
The main change was expanding the online component
Retained in-class large lecture setting
Enforced pre-lecture preparation by checking the completion of assigned pre-lecture tasks

12. Course Online Component
Online component allows students to progress through the materials at their own pace
We use online self- tutoring/homework/assignment system (Mastering Physics from Pearson Education) rthamerica/masteringphysics/ to assign short pre-lecture reading quizzes as well as tutorials and post-lecture extensive homework problem solving assignments

13. Relatively New Features in Mastering Physics
Short videos with built-in self- evaluation questions
Adaptive features for homework assignments (differentiated follow- up assignments that can be added based on the needs of the individual students)
The access to Learning Catalytics is added through MP

14. Reinforcing Pre-Lecture Preparations
Assign pre-lecture textbook reading and/or video watching and
Monitor the compliance: expand pre-lecture assignments to monitor the students compliance with pre- lecture reading and/or watching videos requirement

15. Post-Lectures Homework Problem Solving
Adaptive (differentiated) follow-up assignments based on the needs of the individual students

16. The Results: Learning Environment
Improved compliancy with pre-lecture studies
Improved ongoing automated but highly individualized feedback
Improved consistency between different class sections
Improved accessibility to overcome work and scheduling constraints
With the increase of the online component of the course, the role of the Teaching Assistants shifted from administering and grading toward more tutoring and mentoring roles

17. The Results: Learning Outcomes
The students achieved better mastery of core physics concepts included in the course syllabus
Further improvement in retention and successful completion rate which was achieved without increasing the cost of course delivery

18. Challenges
The students do not complete the suggested tasks unless the activities are graded
Academic integrity issues for the unsupervised online activities

19. Future Plans
Use the systems that allows to ask questions not limited to the multiple choice format
Explore systems that facilitate collaborations between the students
Explore open resources

20. Thank you! Contact : antimiro@ryerson.ca