Abstract:

The use of games and edutainemnt in order to increase the motivation of students is nowadays very common. It has been done for some years in high schools, undergraduate programs and even in programes for graduates. When it comes to part-time studies with a blended learning rate with more than fifty percent, some troubles occur which are completely different from the experiences gained in the full time classes. The institute of Internet-Technologies and Applications at the university of applied sciences FH JOANNEUM in Kapfenberg, Styria, Austria, offers two nearly identical bachelor degree programes, one full-time and one part-time. This paper shows the differences in a course than happens in both programes in the first semester. Furthermore strategies to compensate the lack of social face-to-face contact in the part-time degree programe are presented as well as tools to automatically check submissions by the students and provide direct and immediate feedback.

Keywords:

Edutainment, blended learning, part-time.