The Covid-19 underscored the importance of teaching academics across the globe to reevaluate their courses’ instructional design as well as their own teaching and learning pedagogy so that they remain responsive to meet the current demands of their students and the university where they teach. In the University of the Free State’s (UFS) context, this meant that the instructional redesign of the courses I teach must fit within the institution’s broader strategy which prescribes a blended learning approach. It therefore required careful planning and the investigation of several instructional design models to identify which is best suited for the task. This paper examines my experience in redesigning a foundational module within the extended LLB programme at the UFS, particularly focusing on addressing the unique characteristics and preferences of post-Covid South African law students. While instructional design methods can function in isolation, integrating them can lead to more robust and effective courses that better meet the needs of learners. The key is to select and combine methods purposefully based on the specific context and goals of the course. Accordingly, this paper aims to reflect on the hybrid instructional design model employed to create a flipped learning approach within a blended learning framework. This paper intends to illustrate how I integrated two main instructional design models, namely ADDIE and Fink’s integrated course design (ICD) model, to enhance the instructional design process and address the specific needs of South African law students. The findings, which are mainly based on student participation in the Learner Management System (LMS) activities and the module’s pass rate, will showcase that this hybrid approach fostered an integrated and sequential learning experience that assisted students in succeeding in the module. Reference will be made to the development of crucial graduate attributes necessary for a 21st century law student. This, however, forms part of an ongoing Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) project that warrants further research and will only be alluded to in this paper.

Author: Grey Stopforth

Published in: Ireland International Conference on Education (IICE-2024)

• Date of Conference: 28-30 October, 2024
• DOI: 10.20533/IICE.2024.10.0022
• ISBN: 978-1-913572-73-0
• Conference Location: Dún Laoghaire, Ireland