How to be a page-turner for the right reasons!

[Posted on behalf of Elizabeth Palmer]

When starting to make online activities for blended learning there is a temptation to take content that is currently being delivered face-to-face in lectures (through software such as Powerpoint) and moving that content into an online format where the students are ‘digitally page turning’ through material: read or watch x, y and z before class.
The learning and teaching plan for blended learning is that we are creating interactive activities that support students towards developing their own knowledge, understanding and creating outputs that can then be used in class. In other words we are trying to flip the focus away from tutor created content that the student must passively absorb, to student-led interactive and created content.

Any content provided to students should be done in an interactive, discovery based way i.e. rather than telling them the answer we allow them to discover the answer through questioning, testing, trialling, problem solving etc. online and then reinforce and develop this face to face. If you are trying out e-tivities for the first time Xerte can be a useful package to start this process. Have a look at these two examples of using Xerte to make interactive activities on academic skills: here and here. Whilst they are not necessarily perfect, they demonstrate how you can use Xerte’s functionality to create knowledge checking, interactive exercises that you could then build on in class or use as a basis for students to undertake a more complex task.