Enhancing teaching with active learning: workload flexibility with increased enjoyment

Changing one’s own course to the new academic calendar and introducing learning concepts that motivate students to actively study during the semester (developing and assessing new knowledge and skills) seems to imply a high, often still unknown workload for many lecturers. External lecturers, often paid by the hour, may be reluctant to adopt PAKETH due to concerns about increased workload, potentially hindering reform efforts.

This project focuses on the workflow of faculty from preparation, their implementation and the follow-up of the lectures. By systematically recording the work for teaching tasks, the results should provide insights into the workload per ETH teaching format (V, U, S, G) and teaching method (e.g. flipped classroom, problem-based education (PBE), etc.). This makes the workload for teaching visible and provides a contribution for improved reflection and coordination of the own workload.

With the help of experts, faculty should be able to try out active learning formats such as flipped classroom or project-based teaching in traditional courses and develop an awareness that it is possible to adapt to other formats and methods.

Ultimately, the shift from traditional teaching to active learning methods should improve sustainable learning while not increasing the students’ total workload. This aspect is considered in the additional STUDENTS project, which aims at tracking their quantitative and qualitative workload distribution.

– To make lecturers› workloads transparent and demonstrate how active learning can distribute and flexibilize workloads without overwhelming work.

– To gather feedback from students on their motivation and learning outcomes under the new active learning formats, assessing whether these methods lead to equal or improved educational results compared to traditional approaches.

– To summarize the findings in a comprehensive report that provides insights into the benefits of active learning and recommendations for further enhancing teaching environments towards active learning with an appropriate workload.

Track faculty workload:
Systematically monitor the time faculty spend on various teaching tasks, from preparation to follow-up, to make workload visible and quantifiable.

Analyze workload by teaching format and method:
Classify teaching workload according to format (lecture, tutorial, seminar, group work) and method (e.g., flipped classroom, project-based learning).

Balance workload and enhance teaching enjoyment:
Use workload analysis results to evenly distribute teaching, assessment, and administrative tasks among faculty, encourage adoption of innovative teaching formats like project-based learning, and highlight benefits like time flexibility and increased enjoyment.