Introduction
Online learning has been on the rise in degree-granting universities over the last decade (Seaman et al. , 2018) and describes courses thoughtfully designed to deliver learning materials and support students attending the courses mostly or fully online, either asynchronously or synchronously (Means et al. , 2014; Seaman et al. , 2018; Hodges et al. , 2020). A benefit of online learning is that it allows for higher student enrollment, with students having a higher degree of place and time flexibility to take these classes. All of these factors are especially relevant for students who are in learning abroad programs, are athletes, have disabilities, or are working (Meanset al. , 2014; Branch & Dousay, 2015).
The flexibility of offering online course options became critical with the need for social distancing during the COVID-19 pandemic. In March 2020, students in North America, and many around the world, returned to their places of residence and transitioned to remote instruction to complete courses in progress. Because this was a temporary fix to disruption of face-to-face courses and instructors did not often have time or training to design a thoughtful online course, this form of instruction is often described as remote instruction (Hodges et al. , 2020). Remote instruction recapitulates the face-to-face course but does not necessarily implement online course design elements to facilitate learning (Means et al. , 2014; Hodges et al. , 2020).
While remote instruction during COVID-19 was necessary, it has limitations. One of the main limitations is inherent to remote instruction, during an emergency few instructors had the time to thoroughly consider or implement online tools designed to improve learning in an online environment. Careful course design is especially important because student retention rates are low in online offerings – a trend that is usually linked to a lack of student engagement, accountability, and sense of belonging within the class (O’Keeffe, 2013; Zhu et al. , 2020). Instructors of remote instruction were also adjusting to having fewer opportunities for immediate feedback to help resolve students’ misunderstandings which imposes barriers to achieve positive learning outcomes (Kim et al. , 2005; Clark et al. , 2018). Currently, 23% of over 1000 universities in the USA are planning to switch to hybrid or fully online courses during the Fall term of 2020 (Chronicle Staff, 2020). To maintain the quality of our teaching, it is essential that these courses move beyond remote instruction to use online course design tools that provide adequate learning support to undergraduates in the online classroom (Meanset al. , 2014; Branch & Dousay, 2015).
Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, we worked on addressing some of the remote instruction and online learning pitfalls by purposefully designing an online introductory level evolution and biodiversity course using a Team-Based Learning (TBL) approach. When remote instruction was mandated in March 2020, we were undergoing our third term teaching the online course in parallel to the face-to-face course (See timeline in Figure 1), and we scaled up our efforts to accommodate all face-to-face students in our online platform for the remainder of the semester. Here, we discuss our successful use of TBL in a large face-to-face introductory life science course and how we adapted it to the online platform. We describe pedagogical and technical tools used, as well as the perceived challenges and benefits of implementing TBL in an online course. We also provide a summary of helpful practices and useful literature for those interested in implementing team-based approaches in an online platform.