Blended PBL Support
Education SupportBlended PBL Support
Blended Learning refers to enriched, student-centered learning experiences, made possible by the harmonious integration of various strategies, achieved by combining face-to-face interaction with ICT (Oliver & Trigwell. 2005). However, these new (online) strategies are not just added on, or used to replace offline elements. Blended Learning requires that online and offline methods are carefully selected and designed.
The process of creating these experiences can be time-consuming and sometimes pose a struggle for teachers. They, for instance, need to find out which tools and strategies are available and have to develop digital skills to use ICT-tools within their education. Therefore, the Blended PBL Support team with a background in educational science and psychology offers support and advice on incorporating tools in your education.
We created a Tool wheel to help you find out what online tools are available in the context of several educational scenarios. Depending on the goal, e.g. more interaction with or between your students, integrating skills like peer review or peer assessment, or co-creation and collaborative knowledge building, we focus both on the tool as well as on the instructional design within the context of your program, constructively aligning teaching and learning activities, with intended learning outcomes and assessment. Visit VideUM to learn more about video in education and UM video conferencing tools.
We also focus on the transition from Blackboard to Canvas as in creating a UM template for all courses, providing training for students and staff and performing pilots with the new tools. We partner up with the EDLAB in providing videos and workshops on adapting your course given the implementation of online tools. Next to that, checkout the official UM Online Education portal, which has been launched in order to provide the UM community with information about facilitating education via digital means.
Our Services:
- Facilitation and support on (selecting and implementing) technologies in both offline and online education; we can help you get the best out of the broad variety of tools our digital learning environment has to offer;
- Demonstrations, events, training sessions and workshops on instructional design in the context of blended PBL;
- Give information and help with the use, creation and sharing of Open Educational Resources and working with Creative Common Licenses;
- Discuss any educational question in the context of blended PBL, whether it’s about the use of online tools within your course, digital skills for you or your students or stimulate interaction with students, and much more.
In need for support?
- Check out the online manuals we selected for you or attend a demo or workshop;
- Have your questions answered by the library, or redirected to an expert at the Blended PBL Support team;
- Book a personal consultation to discuss complex questions (one-to-one personal instruction sessions of 60 minutes);
- Tailor-made support based on your (or your teams) wishes/problems.
We invite staff and students to contact us for questions regarding such topics, like trends in e-learning, improving tutorial groups with online and offline pedagogics, and the use of emerging technologies in your education.
Of course, we welcome your ideas about new technologies, whether it’s online or offline, for learning and instruction!
Themes, topics and projects
Blended teaching methods are a means to facilitate teaching or learning activities. We currently work within four main themes, providing a framework for our projects and support offer. The quadrants in the picture (e.g. interaction) refer to information on these themes.
Themes describe topics or activities giving content to the theme (e.g. collaborative knowledge building as an example of interaction) and if applicable, we describe online and offline tools as an option serving the aimed-for activity. Our projects are connected to at least one of the themes.
For every project, you can address the corresponding contact person. For general questions related to Blended teaching methods, contact us via blended-pbl@maastrichtuniversity.nl.
The following means to serve as inspiration, based on current or upcoming projects or topics of interest.
Contact & Support
For questions or information, use the web form to contact a library specialist.