Large Scale Blended Learning Design in an Interprofessional Undergraduate Course in Norway: Context Description and Supervisors’ Perspective

Abstract

Background: Society's demands for better coordination of services for children, young people and their families, are increasing. Many professionals learn about collaboration in their specific professions without having the opportunity to collaborate across study programmes while undergoing pre-service training. Although interprofessional learning (IPL) has been suggested to achieve better services, better outcomes and reduced costs, IPL studies have mainly been restricted to health care.Aim: to describe the transformation of an IPL course with plenary activities into an IPL blended learning course approach (no plenary activities) in conjunction with a quadrupling of the number of students, and to reflect on the possibilities and limitations related to structural and outcome aspects.Methods: Design: exploratory cross-sectional study. Students (n=1,401) from teacher educations, health and social care study programmes worked in 196 IPL groups using a combination of digital learning resources and face-to-face discussions, during two days of seminars and through a group submission assignment. Supervisors (n = 39, response rate 61%) evaluated the course delivery through an online questionnaire.Results: Three quarters of the supervisors were highly satisfied with the use of 'student-active learning methods rather than lectures', and the IPL blended learning approach. They ranked the students' learning outcomes from the face-to-face activities on campus twice as high as that of the assignment, and three times higher than that of the syllabus. Nearly (92.3%) agreed that the blended learning IPL course was relevant for professional practice when working with children, young peoples and their families.Conclusions: Blended learning is a feasible approach in the context of large-scale IPL. Supervisors agreed that the course was relevant to pre-service training on working with children, young people and their families. Since

Small Group Student-Produced Podcasts Were Favoured as Assignment Tool for Large-Scale Interprofessional Learning: An Exploratory Study Among Health, Social Care, and Teacher Education Program

“…During 6 and 7 January 2020, a large-scale mandatory IPL training course was held within the framework of the Interprofessional Interaction with Children and Youth (INTERACT) project (Almendingen et al, 2021) at Oslo Metropolitan University (OsloMet) in Norway. The IPL course was designed for bachelor students taking health, social care and teacher education study programs.…”

“…The large-scale blended learning IPL course is described in detail elsewhere (Almendingen et al, 2021). The learning outcome was: "The course is about 1) acquiring common knowledge about children and adolescents and 2) learning about the observation of children and adolescents" (Almendingen et al, 2021).…”

“…The large-scale blended learning IPL course is described in detail elsewhere (Almendingen et al, 2021). The learning outcome was: "The course is about 1) acquiring common knowledge about children and adolescents and 2) learning about the observation of children and adolescents" (Almendingen et al, 2021). The required coursework included participation in a two-day seminar (working in the IPL groups only with no plenary activities) and the submission of an IPL group assignment.…”

“…Since the IPL course was in an innovative phase and assessment was formative (i.e., assessment for learning), there were no exams or grades. Fewer than five students dropped out of their study programs, and therefore also from the IPL course (Almendingen et al, 2021). Although some IPL groups were told to re-do the same assignments, all group assignments were approved in the end.…”

“…Because no suitable national or international questionnaire had been developed and/or validated into Norwegian, online questionnaires for the present study had to be specially prepared. The questionnaires developed were based on earlier questionnaire-based quantitative research using an anonymous self-administrated web survey "Nettskjema" (Nettskjema, 2020), and results from the first course delivery (Almendingen et al, 2021). "Nettskjema" is a tool for designing and conducting online surveys with customized features for research.…”