Making lab-based content accessible in H5P

BIOSCI 107 lies within the discipline of Biomedical science. Typically, a variety of students major in Biology, Biomedical Science, Bioengineering, Sports Science, Nursing or other health-related disciplines. The course aims to teach students about cells and tissues, cell structure and function, the blood and immune system, cellular processes and excitable tissues such as muscle and neural tissues.

The disruption of an Anzac Day public holiday falling during a lab week first prompted the conversion of the haematology lab into an online exercise. This was possible because cell counting could be done on an image instead of under a microscope.

However, the Covid-19 restrictions resulted in a consequential need to replicate more of a real lab’s visual and interactive aspects. The content included labs on:

• genetic processing
• haematology
• osmolarity
• muscle function

In terms of planning and design, Monica mostly planned and created the lab modules herself. H5P, videos and Canvas quizzes are used to create online lab learning resources.

Various laws and policies had to be considered, for example, the copyright of images. For accessibility, subtitles were used in all video content for the hearing-impaired.

Since this was a large class of first-year students, lab submissions needed to be as simple as possible (no uploading of documents, minimising the need to access multiple resources). The lab modules included some unmarked activities for formative learning, followed by questions marked for summative grading.

A large team of Graduate Teaching Assistants and Teaching Assistants helped to test and refine the lab modules.

Students were encouraged to complete the lab modules and to contact their tutors on Piazza if they had any questions.

As part of the continuous improvement process, the lab modules continued to be evaluated and revised based on peer review and feedback from students.

First iteration

H5P and its reporting function were solely used to deliver the online lab content. However, there were several issues found:

• Automatic import of grades into the Canvas Gradebook was not always reliable.
• H5P answers were not encrypted and, therefore, not secure for summative grading.
• The chosen format meant it could not assess more complex skills like drawing, graphing, essay writing, etc.

The student feedback indicated that they enjoyed these H5P-only labs because they were simple to use and self-contained.

Second iteration

H5P formative activities were embedded in a Canvas Quiz’s ‘instruction’ box. This method allowed students to submit graphs, which is an advantage for teachers as it lets them teach complex skills. However, students disliked the fact that they had to use different modes of submission (answer quiz questions online AND upload files). They also disliked that they had to answer questions within the H5P activities which were not marked and then had to answer similar questions again within the summative quiz.

Third iteration

H5P formative activities were embedded within a textbox in Canvas Quiz, and interspersed with marked summative questions within the same Canvas Quiz. The disadvantage of this method is that students may need to navigate through the quiz vertically (scroll down) and/or horizontally (move through the slides), depending on the H5P activities. The advantage is that Monica could ask students summative questions without them feeling it was repetitive. Canvas Quiz also allows multiple dropdown questions that were unavailable in H5P, so multi-step questions could be designed.

• H5P should not be used for summative marking due to issues with encryption. It is easy for tech-savvy students to access answers, creating an inequitable learning experience.
• Students need explicit communication about what questions are formative and which are summative.
• Students like visual information, especially the interactive videos showing activities they would have carried out in the lab.
• Students prefer consistent assignment submissions (one method for the whole semester).
• Always get multiple people to test the resources created because it gives a good idea of how students might interpret a question.
• Online activities can be used to teach the disciplinary knowledge offered in the lab. However, hands-on skills cannot be effectively taught, as watching videos is a poor substitute for practical experience.