Perceptions of lecturers who apply blended learning in a Faculty of Science

Abstract

Universities of Technology are renowned for their career-focused education, which constitute a key component of the workforce and economic strategy of South Africa. Significant progress has been made to develop and utilize alternative instructional technologies. Leaders in education globally, believe that alternative teaching strategies, like blended learning, can address academic challenges experienced by institutions of higher learning. Life Science courses frequently comprise of two components namely, a theoretical and a practical part. These often involve complex concepts, difficult to incorporate in a pure online learning setting. A blend of face-to-face and online learning approaches result in blended learning. The Faculty of Science at TUT adopted the latter as teaching and learning strategy. This study aimed to investigate the perceptions of lecturing staff (participants from Life Science departments) regarding the usefulness of the implementation and the ease of utilization of blended learning. Digital questionnaires and semi-structured interviews were used as measuring instruments to determine the perceptions of participants. Inductive thematic analysis was used to generate codes (quirks) from the information obtained. A modified conceptual framework highlighted seven (7) main themes and forty-three (43) sub-themes arising from these codes. The research questions were adequately addressed by the recorded results. Key findings showed that participants believed blended learning (and teaching) is a highly effective teaching technique TUT should engage with. Participants concluded that they would not revert to exclusively conventional face-to-face teaching methods, but rather continue to embrace the flexible and adaptive character of blended learning, which is considered a cutting-edge method, globally.