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Correlation of Web usage and exam performance in a human anatomy and development course
Lawrence J Rizzolo1, Marcus Aden, William B Stewart
1Section of Anatomy, Department of Surgery, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut 06510, USA. lawrence.rizzolo@yale.edu
Clinical Anatomy (New York, N.Y.)
|August 31, 2002
Summary
Students primarily used online course materials for exam preparation, not daily study. Lower-performing students accessed fewer web resources, suggesting a need for more interactive online anatomy and development learning tools.
Area of Science:
- Medical Education
- Online Learning Technologies
Background:
- Course materials for Human Anatomy and Development were digitized and placed on the World Wide Web (WWW).
- Materials included lab manuals, lecture notes, slides, atlases, web links, and examinations.
- Anonymity was maintained through student code names for web access and examinations.
Purpose of the Study:
- To track student web usage patterns.
- To correlate web usage with final examination performance.
- To evaluate the efficiency of providing all course materials online.
Main Methods:
- Student web access was tracked and anonymously recorded.
- Web usage data was correlated with final examination scores.
- Access patterns of top, middle, and bottom performing student groups were compared.
Main Results:
- Most students used the WWW site for exam preparation, not daily studying.
- Old examinations were the most accessed documents; lecture notes were least accessed.
- Students in the bottom score group used web resources significantly less than other groups; frequent users scored below the mean.
Conclusions:
- Online course materials are primarily used for examination review.
- Students with lower academic performance utilized online resources less.
- Interactive online exercises may be more beneficial than simply digitizing all course materials.