Exploring the Uses and Effects of Online Homework

A number of textbook publishers offer supplemental online homework systems that instructors can adapt when using the corresponding textbook. Deploying online homework assignments in quantitative courses can be particularly desirable as these provide students with opportunities to practice concepts recently learned, often with immediate feedback. Online homework systems can be designed, not only to tell whether or not a student's answer is correct, but also to provide students with diagnostic and tutorial feedback that enables them to improve their performance on future attempts. (Brewer, 2009; Jacobsen, 2006; Johnston, 2002) Using a mixed methods design, the presenters examined the uses and effects of one particular online homework system in three undergraduate level quantitative courses at a small Midwestern public university. Questions addressed by our research include: 1. Do students learn better from homework activities completed online than they do from traditional homework activities? 2. Do students spend more time on online homework than they do on traditional homework activities? 3. Do students prefer doing homework online to doing homework in the traditional way? 4. Do students find online homework more useful, satisfying and/or motivating than regular textbook homework? 5. How do faculty feel about online homework? Students for our study were drawn from four class sections in a variety of quantitatively-oriented undergraduate courses, including courses in the areas of psychology, economics and accounting. Three of the courses were taught in a face-to-face mode; one was a fully online course. In each face-to-face course sections, some units were taught using online homework , some units were taught using traditional homework, and some units were taught using both. Using within-subjects comparisons, we examined differences in learning based on the type of homework assigned. In the fully online course, assignments in the online homework program were compared with assignments developed by the instructor. We also examined the relationship between time spent completing the online homework (i.e. "time-on-task") and performance on class assessments. In addition to presenting the quantitative results of our data, we will also discuss our qualitative findings. Surveys and interviews used to explore students' engagement and satisfaction with both online and traditional types of homework were conducted. Faculty perceptions of the quality, ease of use, and perceived efficacy of online homework will also collected and will be discussed. Data has been collected for this research project but is still being analyzed. A full report on this project will have been completed and will be presented at the November conference. Implications for practice will be explored. Audience engagement will be facilitated through initial polling of the audience for their experiences with online homework activities, audience participation in demonstration activities, and by reserving time at the end of the session for questions and discussion. Participants will be provided with online access to the presentation slides. They will be introduced to the uses of the online homework that comes with many textbooks and will gain an understanding of its advantages and disadvantages. The outline the presentation will go by will be similar to the following: Introduction to Online Homework Polling/discussion with participants re: their experiences Demonstration Research study Research questions Subjects and setting Data Sources and analysis Results Implications for Practice Discussion