Blending the engineer’s learning environment through the use of audio

A blended approach to learning, teaching and assessment has been part of curriculum design in the teaching of Software Engineering to engineers since 2003 when the Blackboard VLE was first used alongside lectures and laboratorybased assignments. In seeking a greater degree of integration between physical and virtual learning spaces we have been keen to explore how digital audio can be used to engage and develop students. Digital audio has shown itself to be a simple media with which to work and a simple media to distribute. Its essential value has proven to be in how it supports access to the disparate voices available to education and we have developed several ideas. These include Audio Notes to support lectures, educational podcasting and audio feedback to bridge the virtual and physical environments towards offering a more meaningful, richer, and formative learning experience. Our recent work has proven that digital audio is generally accessible to, and valued by students, and that it can lead to greater ongoing engagement in the module. This paper focuses on the formative feed forward potential of this flexible media and illustrates how we have built upon initial successes by improving the design and integration of audio feedback. It describes how the techniques have been used to promote an holistic blended learning environment and how this has affected both the student and the tutor.