Creating Instructor Dashboards to Foster Collaborative Learning in On-Line Medical Problem-Based Learning Situations

Problem-based learning (PBL) refers to a student-centered pedagogy in which students collaborate with each other to solve complex problems. There are many benefits to this approach, such as improving student problem-solving skills, developing group-work skills and motivation. However, it is built upon low student-teacher ratios, which places increased demands on instructors, making traditional forms of PBL costly to implement in large-enrolment courses). This suggests that it is important to find ways to extend expert facilitation to multiple groups. Based on this approach, we have implemented an online, asynchronous learning environment entitled HOWARD (Helping Others With Argumentation and Reasoning Dashboard) which aims to foster multiple small PBLs and boost their instructional capacity. Beyond supporting instructors to handle multiple groups at the same time, our computer-supported PBL environment can allow learners to connect across cultures and disciplines, enabling them to interact beyond boundaries of location, time and space.