Department of Curriculum and Pedagogy

Objective
This study assessed senior dental hygiene (DH) students’ self‐reported confidence in interpreting dental radiographs following the introduction of a blended learning (BL) module for radiology interpretation. The assessment of students was conducted five months prior to graduation.

Methods
A BL oral radiology module was designed. In order to capture the context, descriptions and differences of students’ experience and confidence, a qualitative research approach was selected. Data were captured using a semi‐structured interview process and analysed using phenomenographic methods.

Results
Sixteen students were interviewed. Blinded transcripts were analysed, and the main themes relating to confidence were extracted and arranged into categories. The categories were coded as to how confident (low, medium or high) each of the students felt specific to varying contexts and complexities of radiographic interpretation.

Conclusion
Predominately, the BL model had a positive impact on DH students’ confidence in the interpretation of radiographic findings. However, when asked about their level of overall confidence in interpreting dental radiographs, students still did not describe themselves as confident for all potential findings on radiographs at this point in their education. The students highlighted the importance of having patient history details and clinical assessment findings included in the interpretation exercises and expressed a desire to collaborate with other professionals when interpreting radiographs.

The CEAB accreditation requirement of graduate attributes and continual improvement processes (GACIP) has been a pervasive topic in the annual CEEA conference proceedings since 2010. The proceedings are a rich primary source of work being done in Canadian tertiary institutions. This narrative review of the literature consolidates and discusses the relevant CEEA papers for 2010-2017 in a manner that is useful to leadership and decision-makers at accredited faculties of Engineering nationwide.

Four guiding research questions were asked of this literature: (1) What general frameworks are being implemented as accredited faculties of Engineering across Canada approach GACIP?; (2) What are the specific activities and methods of one or more of the GACIP steps?; (3) What are the roles and responsibilities of people involved?; and (4) What perspectives are taken in response to the CEAB accreditation criteria, including concerns, issues, and benefits? A qualitative content analysis was conducted on 106 papers meeting selection criteria. Emergent topics were used to form the discussion.

ENGG404 Engineering Safety and Risk Management at the University of Alberta was restructured from a traditional lecture format to a blended learning format employing multifaceted teaching and learning components. Key objectives were: to foster Canadian Engineering Accreditation Board Graduate Attribute development, to include the collaborative team project, and to maintain course quality while enabling course management with an enrollment increase to over 1,100 students per academic year.

The new course structure focuses on the collaborative team project, as was implemented in Fall 2016. The new structure was observed to have developed student competencies in four Graduate Attributes, maintained course quality, delivered content specific to students’ field-of-study, managed enrollment increases, and improved course quality by maximizing face-to-face student-instructor and peer-to-peer discussions

It has been shown in educational literature that teachers’ beliefs about knowledge and knowing, referred to as epistemic beliefs, affect how they approach classroom instruction. However, there has been a lack of study into epistemic belief profiles of science teachers and their relationship to epistemic development in a Western Canadian context. In this study, teachers were recruited from high school science departments in an Alberta, Canada school district. They were asked to respond to a short, online survey about their epistemic beliefs of science. Teacher responses were analyzed based on various demographic information and its relationship to an epistemic development framework. Findings discuss the differences between these demographic groups within particular dimensions of epistemic beliefs developed within the survey, particularly in the certainty of the knowledge dimension. Surprisingly, little difference was found between the two groups in regards to years of experience, conflicting with other literature around epistemic development.