Promoting academic writing/referencing skills: Outcome of an undergraduate e‐learning pilot project

Future health care professionals will require self‐directed learning skills. e‐Learning is a tool to assist in this process and therefore there is a need to develop the capacity and readiness to utilise e‐learning within educational programmes. The aim of this study was to determine if extra‐curricular online referencing and anti‐plagiarism lectures would be utilised and would ultimately improve 1st‐year undergraduate health sciences students’ performance in written assessments. A series of six online archived multimedia lectures (asynchronous) were offered. Adult learning theory principles guided the resource design. Pre‐ and post‐testing of knowledge, attitudes and computer skills was carried out. In‐person tutorials and online email support were also offered. Less than 36% (self‐report) of students accessed the online resources. The poor uptake revealed in this study is consistent with a number of other studies. These findings indicate the need for more careful scrutiny of the learning theory applied in e‐learning design. Prochaska's transtheoretical model is suggested as a framework with strong potential for e‐learning initiatives.