More teaching only a few clicks away

Students taking  very theoretical courses are now offered on-line exercises

It is not mandatory, but it has turned out to be very popular. It's all about on-line revision in which students are able to practice in selected elements of the theory through the internet and obtain a response from the lecturer. Information and communication technology is becoming more common in relation to the teaching activities. According to Sven Bislev, Vice Dean for Education, on-line exercises will be a significant part of the education strategy in the next years.

- Our aim is to offer all students to perform exercises through a digital portal during their first years of study, says Sven Bislev.

He emphasises that the on-line exercises are best suited for courses in which a large part of elementary theory requires repeated exercises, such as statistics, economics, English, mathematics and IT.

More active student participation

The lecturer will also be able to see how much time the students have spent on the assignment and how it has been solved. If the majority of the students have misunderstood the theory in a certain assignment, the lecturer will know that the assignment might need to be rewritten.

Pilot experiments have shown that the lecturer's feedback is very useful to the students.

- The fact that the lecturer has provided on-line feedback to the students has definitely increased the active student participation during teaching, says Leslie Christensen, lecturer in economics in the BSc programmes. He is using the on-line exercises for the second year in a row.

Active student participation has turned out to affect the drop-out rates at the beginning of the semester. The supplementary on-line teaching may be an effective means to battle the drop-out rates, as the students are spending more time doing exercises and participate actively during class.

More courses to come

At CBS, the first courses implemented on-line exercises in 2010, and today, they are being used in courses like macro-economics, micro-economics and statistics. 80 percent of the students who are taking micro-economics in the BSc in Economics and Business Administration are making use of the offer. In other courses, the number is even higher.

In 2012, macro-economics and statistics are also going to implement the revision exercises. Sven Bislev expects that all students will be offered the opportunities over the next years. In some cases, however, the textbooks need to be replaced before the on-line exercises will work as a supplement.