Evaluation of a Learner-Centered Activating Learning Situation with Large Cohorts in the University

This Research to Practice Full Paper presents the evaluation results of a didactic concept for activating a large cohort of students in a classical lecture hall. The aim of the concept is to reduce factors that lead to study drop-out. The didactic concept is based on problem-based learning and flipped classroom approaches and enables the control of problem solutions via a remote laboratory. Developed according to the design-based research, the concept is tested in information technology courses in 2019 and 2020 and evaluated with a SOLOMON design. The activation of the large cohort basically worked, but the majority did not work on the problem-based tasks without extrinsic motivation. The results show that variables of the factors study motivation (interest in future jobs p < 0.001) and application orientation (p = 0.002) can be significantly improved by the didactic concept. The factor performance problems (e.g. workload p < 0.001) is rated significantly worse by the experimental group students, while their examination results in problem-oriented tasks, however, improved significantly by more than 50 % (p < 0.001).