Enquiry, Engagement, and eLearning - Three Perspectives on a Student-Centred, Online, Enquiry-Based Course

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by awa

The article presents a conversation on a 2011 Winter-semester pedagogical experiment at the University of Guelph: an online first-year seminar. Three participants reflect on how enquiry-based learning shapes technology and pedagogy, how students experience online interaction, and how cases support analysis of complex issues such as global and North American hunger. The discussion compares this seminar’s innovation in enquiry-based learning and first-year teaching with classroom-based offerings.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages7

Reading Time18 min

AccessFree to download

Introduction

Enquiry-based learning in context

Course Design and Experience

Delivery model and collaboration

Student experience of EBL

7 Enquiry, Engagement, and eLearning: Three Perspectives on a Student-Centred, Online, Enquiry-Based Course Jacqueline Murray, Natalie Giesbrecht, & Samuel Mosonyi University of Guelph In the 2011 Winter semester, the University of Guelph engaged in a pedagogical experiment: an online first-year seminar. This article is a conversation about the learning journey that surrounds this seminar, as experienced by three participants: Jacqueline Murray (JM), Professor of History and Director of the FirstYear Seminar Program (FYS); Natalie Giesbrecht (NG), Manager, Distance Education and a Distance Learning Specialist; and Samuel Mosonyi (SM), an undergraduate student who was enrolled in the course. We reflect upon the online seminar and discuss the technology and pedagogy, student learning experience, and process of online interaction. We conclude that this seminar, an innovation in both enquiry-based learning and first-year seminars, is arguably comparable with classroom-based offerings. Introduction J M: I have been facilitating first-year seminars since 2004. The First-Year Seminar (FYS) Program provides small, intensive, interdisciplinary learning experiences for first-year students. Over the years, I have developed seminars on a variety of interdisciplinary themes. Consequently, when the opportunity to develop a seminar on The Politics, Science, and Culture of Hunger arose, I was most enthusiastic. This seminar would be offered online, something that had never occurred in the FYS Program, which generally prided itself on close faculty-student contact. First-year seminars are capped at eighteen students to ensure interactivity and engagement. When I facilitate a face-to-face group, I employ a specific pedagogy: closedloop, reiterative, enquiry-based learning (EBL) (Barrows, 1986; Murray & Summerlee, 2007; Summerlee & Murray, 2010). Enquiry-based learning is a pedagogy that is both engaging and challenging. It fosters deep learning and transferable skills and so meets the learning objectives of the FYS Program. Enquiry-based learning is part of the pedagogical constellation that includes problem-based learning (PBL) and inquiry-based learning (IBL) . PBL is less a specific pedagogy than an umbrella term that includes multiple approaches to learning that focus on a problem. Enquiry and inquiry-based learning focus on the process of research and investigation. The inquiry approach at McMaster University looks to “new knowledge and new understanding”(Hudspith & Jenkins, 2001) . Enquiry-based learning is more focused on the process of questioning, using cases to encourage open-ended enquiry rather than to arrive at solutions (Summerlee & Murray, 2010) . I was committed to using EBL in the online seminar, given my experience with the pedagogy. Admittedly, having had no previous experience with online learning, I had no clear idea what this might actually entail. Enquiry-based learning is a more process-oriented than content-oriented pedagogy. Students analyze a number of scenarios pertaining to the seminar’s theme (Garrison & Cleveland-Innes, 2005) . These examples provide the context for student learning. Students develop their analytical, research, and presentation skills, and engage in deep learning as they analyze complex multidisciplinary issues and consult the research necessary in order to understand them. I developed a number of cases that examine the complexities of hunger in both global and North American contexts, for use in the online seminar. Through these examples, students would confront issues of food security in refugee camps, genetically modified foods that could help alleviate hunger, competing or contradictory government policies, and strategies to address domestic hunger. I developed the theme of the seminar and its scenarios in the same way as I would for a face-to-face seminar, but I had no idea how the course could be structured for online delivery or how the cases would work in an o

FAQs

What online course experiment does the article discuss, and when was it offered?

It discusses an online first-year seminar run in the 2011 Winter semester at the University of Guelph.

How is enquiry-based learning (EBL) characterized in the seminar approach?

EBL is presented as process-oriented, engaging, and challenging, using cases to encourage questioning and research rather than aiming directly at fixed solutions.

How was the online seminar structured to support student collaboration and success?

The seminar followed an asynchronous delivery model and divided students into smaller groups of six working together throughout the semester.

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by awa