Designing a blended delivery foundation mathematics course: Targeting self-efficacy, skill development and social connectedness

Foundation mathematics courses play a crucial role in allowing students who have not achieved the pre-requisite mathematics credits for tertiary studies to re-engage with STEM studies. This paper describes how targeting self-efficacy, skill development and social connectedness have influenced the design of a foundation mathematics course at a New Zealand university. These design goals are grounded in education literature, and the paper outlines how focusing on these goals has resulted in the design of a course that incorporates novel approaches to learning and assessment, including online and face-to-face components. These approaches include the use of large, automatically graded weekly quizzes; adaptive learning quizzes for essential skills such as fraction arithmetic; and an emphasis on face-to-face learning and connection through tutorials and collaborative problem-solving workshops. The paper concludes with reflections on the success of the course so far and raising questions for future investigation.