Students' choice of learning methods: Seeking the best mix of face-to-face and e-interactions

Research shows that the Internet has revolutionized the delivery of distance education, and provided opportunities to change the way we teach. Students with access to both traditional lectures and an online learning environment fair better academically than students exposed exclusively to either traditional classroom or Internet instruction respectively. However, the 'perfect' mix of face-to-face and e-interaction, if there is one, has yet to be determined. A classroom action research project that extended over three semesters was designed to address and ascertain the 'best mix model'. After two semesters of preliminary experiments, students in the third semester will have a choice to study course content exclusively on-line, off-line or a mix of on-line and off-line instructional methods. After students will have made their choice, the 'choice' as dependent variable will be analyzed against the respective answers in responses on the pre-assessment.