Executive SummaryThere is an increasing demand and expectation for universities to incorporate greater levels of technology into the design and delivery of their curriculum. From an academic perspective, it is of significant interest to determine whether the increased use and availability of online teaching resources have made a positive impact on students' academic performance and whether this is reflected in improved learning outcomes. This paper reports on the findings from a survey of first-year accounting students to assess the level of student engagement with online learning resources. The results indicate that, despite having three new online options readily available via WebCT, students expressed strong support for the traditional face-to-face approaches delivery as the more effective learning options. To determine whether the access to additional online resources had any impact in assisting the students' learning in this subject and potentially affecting their assessment outcomes, a review was conducted to compare the overall pass rates attained. It was found that the period in which the improvement was most significant coincided with the availability of online recordings lectures and tutorials. An investigation of WebCT Course Management Statistical Tools revealed a positive relationship between the level of student engagement with online resources and their overall academic result. Across the key online activities measured, the time spent on each activity was considerably longer for the High Distinction students in comparison to failed students. The analysis of the results has been beneficial in identifying the online learning resources that are most useful in supporting student learning and provide guidance for further enhancement to the design and delivery of e-learning content in this subject.Keywords: student engagement, online resources, technology, learning outcomes, e-learning
IntroductionThe continual emergence of new technologies has placed academic staff under increasing pressure to react to these substantial changes within a very short and often unrealistic time-frame. As stated by Bates and Poole (2003, p.xiii), one of the major challenges of teaching with technology is that "you cannot possibly keep up with the technology. The paradox of technology enhanced education is that technology changes very rapidly and human beings change very slowly." This paper is written from the viewpoint of the coordinator of an introductory accounting subject. The students enrolled in this compulsory first-year accounting subject are a very diverse group comprising accounting and non-accounting students from a broad spectrum of business degrees which range from music through toMaterial published as part of this publication, either on-line or in print, is copyrighted by the Informing Science Institute. Permission to make digital or paper copy of part or all of these works for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that the copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantag...