Crowdsourcing Exams to Increase Student Engagement in an Online Information Technology Class: An Experience Report

To achieve better success rates in online courses, we need to cultivate student engagement. Students learn more when they are actively engaged. However, most instructors still use traditional lecture methods. Because instructors have not embraced active learning in their face-to-face classes, many are finding it challenging to incorporate active learning into their courses as they move online. Prior research has found that although students learn more from active learning activities, they do not feel like they are learning more, which can have a detrimental impact to their satisfaction with the activity and the course. Studies have found that with more training and promotion, students' attitudes can change; however, this takes additional time and effort which instructors and students can find discouraging. Our research reports on the experience of using a crowdsourcing activity to create exam questions. Without any promotion from the instructor, students reported that this activity helped them feel engaged with the course materials and helped them learn. We discuss the contributing factors that added to student positivity, as well as challenges in adopting this active learning method.