Abstract:
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While an online course provides flexibility in time and location for students, it can be challenging for students to stay motivated in a non-traditional learning environment. Time and location flexibility may foster procrastination, loss of interest and even failure, especially for students who are new to the subject or the virtual learning environment. Student engagement, e.g., the willingness to master the subject, plays an important role in removing these obstacles to success. I applied adult learning theories to design and teach an online introductory Biostatistics course in an online Master of Public Health program. I used the pedagogy sound approach to motivate, promote and maintain student engagement via student-content, student-student and student-instructor engagement. As a result, 99% (95% CI, 100%-97%) of the students who enrolled in the course demonstrated satisfactory performance, including those without experience in Statistics. Student pre- and post-course survey responses also support that the learner-centered approach enriched with adult learning theories can increase student engagement, confidence and performance in an online graduate-level Biostatistics course.
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