Impact of online quizzes on students' results in a blended learning system of an engineering subject

Due to rapid changes in the communication technologies, teaching and learning have changed dramatically over the last two decades. Nevertheless, the face-to-face (classroom-based) teaching remains one of the most predominant ways of imparting knowledge to students. On the other hand, different online activities are increasingly being used to supplement traditional face-to-face engagement. In this chapter, engagement strategies adopted while delivering Infrastructure Engineering (one of the civil engineering subjects) of the Bachelor of Engineering program offered at Western Sydney University (WSU) are presented. The subject includes mathematical calculations and completion of a design project using computer-aided design (CAD) software. In addition, students participate in an online in-class engagement tool and after-lecture weekly quizzes, tutorial sessions and a final exam. While some of the activities in the subject, such as in-class engagement tool and weekly quizzes, are online, tutorial sessions are delivered via face-to-face mode. It was found that the failure rate was significantly lower (17%–24%) for students who passed online quizzes compared to the failure rate (31%–63%) for students who failed in the quizzes. This indicates that online quizzes have led to deeper understanding of the lecture materials covered in the subject.