Introduction

Teaching and learning in higher education have witnessed tremendous digitalisation in the last few decades. The global trend, especially after the deadly outbreak of coronavirus (COVID-19), has been the integration of technologies with the teaching and learning process (Kimmons et al., 2021). Nigeria is not an exception. After the COVID-19 outbreak, universities across Nigeria have intensified advocacy through university-based seminars and workshops on adopting various forms of technology integration in the teaching and learning process. The conventional lecture approach, once ubiquitous in higher education, is increasingly criticised for its passivity, hindering students’ critical thinking. This method, focusing solely on face-to-face interaction, lacks space for collaborative learning and the development of higher-level thinking skills (Okaz, 2015). Meanwhile, the shift from conventional teaching methods to online environments poses challenges for university administrators, lecturers, and students (Orji et al., 2021). These challenges range from inadequate technological resources, lack of technical know-how, and technological divide among students, especially in developing countries. The rise of digital devices like computers, smartphones, and tablets has further impacted students’ attention spans and information retention, necessitating a restructuring of the learning process (Okaz, 2015; Pg Abu Bakar et al., 2023). In response to these challenges, blended learning emerges as a strategic approach in higher education, integrating online methods with face-to-face interaction.

Blended learning, according to Garrison and Kanuka (2004) is “the thoughtful integration of classroom face-to-face learning experiences with online learning experiences” (p. 96). This definition presupposes a deliberate integration of synchronous face-to-face teaching and learning activity with synchronous/nonsynchronous computer-mediation instruction while offering a promising future for emerging technologies (Liu et al., 2024). Using blended learning, one can seamlessly address issues related to engagement, flexibility, and effectiveness compared to conventional teaching methods (Rajaram, 2023). Rooted in psychology and pedagogy, blended learning considers instructional design and pedagogical frameworks to enhance student performance, retention, and the quality of instruction, particularly in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields (Bazelais and Doleck, 2018a). Through individual interaction with students, teachers can identify the learning needs of students, thereby allowing them to adjust or design lesson plans to suit students’ learning progress (Attard and Holmes, 2022; Bazelais et al., 2022; Keržič et al., 2019). It is a teaching approach that positively impacts students’ learning and teachers’ instruction.

According to Attard and Holmes (2022), teachers who participated in their study could enhance students’ access to mathematics learning materials through digital resources, thereby creating multiple pathways for students’ learning. At the same time, blended learning contributed to teachers’ ability to effectively apply digital technologies to teaching and learning while accommodating students with diverse learning styles (Attard and Holmes, 2022). Blended learning does not only cater to societal, educational needs but also supports individual development by reconstructing core educational elements. By combining physical and virtual learning environments, blended learning provides a dynamic and personalised educational experience, promoting lifelong learning, curiosity, and problem-solving skills (Zavalevskyi et al., 2023). The approach offers individualised feedback, caters to diverse learning styles, and increases student engagement through a variety of activities and tools, such as virtual classrooms and online assessments (Evenhouse et al., 2023; Knie et al., 2022).

Despite the enormous benefits of blended learning in higher education, its implementation is sparse. This is not to mention the scarcity of its research in the Nigerian context. The implementation of blended learning in Nigerian institutions is plagued with a variety of challenges ranging from lack of technological gadgets, epileptic power supply, low internet connectivity, uneven access to technologies, and lack of technical know-how (Orji et al., 2021). Consequently, carefully designed empirical research on blended learning is lacking in Nigerian higher education. This present study aims to fill this gap by investigating students’ perceptions of a blended learning course at a Nigerian University. We carefully redesigned a traditionally taught undergraduate course for pre-service STEM teachers to suit a blended learning environment and then examined its acceptance among the pre-service teachers. Being the first time using blended learning to teach this course, we deem it necessary to explore students’ perceptions of this innovation. In this article, we report our experience with this innovative approach while addressing the following overarching research question: What are pre-service STEM teachers’ perceptions of a blended learning course in a Nigerian university? The findings of this study will provide dynamic perspectives of blended learning from an African context with implications for stakeholders and researchers worldwide.

Throughout this article, opinions, perceptions, and attitudes will keep coming up and worth clarifying. Following some insights from the literature (Zakariya et al., 2024), we define opinions as personal beliefs or judgments of pre-service teachers that may not be based on empirical evidence. As for perception, it is the process by which pre-service teachers interpret sensory information to form a coherent understanding of the blended learning environment. Further, attitudes are predispositions of pre-service teachers to respond favourably or unfavourably to the blended learning course often formed by underlying beliefs and perceptions (Zakariya et al., 2024). We contend that while opinions are explicit expressions, perceptions are foundational, shaping how attitudes are formed and influencing pre-service teachers’ behaviour and outcomes. This makes the three concepts interrelated yet distinct in this research. We organise the remaining parts of this article as follows: section ‘Theoretical perspectives’ presents the theoretical foundations of using blended learning in higher education, including some insights from the literature. Section ‘Materials and methods’ discusses issues related to our methods of data collection, analysis, and interpretation of results. Then, we present our results in the section ‘Results’ and discuss our findings in the section ‘Discussion’. Section ‘Conclusions’, before the references, presents crucial conclusions of our findings including implications and recommendations for researchers and practitioners.

Theoretical perspectives

Conceptualising blended learning

Researchers (e.g., Liu et al., 2024) have traced the origin of blended learning to training in corporate human resources in the 1960s. The concept of blended learning has grown tremendously with different, at times conflicting, conceptualisations in the literature. The debate has been around the question of what is blended in blended learning. Graham (2006) explores various conceptualisations of blended learning and classifies them into three groups while addressing the question of what is being blended in blended learning. These include blending multiple instructional media, multiple instructional methods, and blending online with conventional physical classroom instruction (Graham, 2006). He aligned himself with the third group and conceptualised blended learning as a combination of “face-to-face instruction with computer-mediated instruction” (Graham, 2006, p. 5). This conceptualisation stressed the role of technologies in a blended learning environment. However, it is not clear the type of face-to-face instruction (teacher-centred, student-centred, or a blend of these two) being referred to by Graham (2006). This question is especially important now that the teaching and learning process in higher education is moving towards active learning approaches that deeply engage students with the content and foster peer-to-peer interactions (Zakariya et al., 2022). In addition, the conceptualisation of blended learning proposed by Graham (2006) is not explicit on the meaning of combination and in which ratio should face-to-face instruction be combined with computer-mediated instruction to make a blend. Based on these points, alternative conceptualisations of blended learning have been proposed.

For instance, Bliuc et al. (2007) argued that “blended learning describes learning activities that involve a systematic combination of co-present (face-to-face) interactions and technologically-mediated interactions between students, teachers and learning resources” (p. 234). This definition emphasises the need to be thoughtful while combining active learning instruction with computer-mediated instruction. As an outcome of an international workshop on blended learning, Picciano (2009) substituted the term combination with integration and conceptualised blended learning courses as “courses that integrate online with traditional face-to-face class activities in a planned, pedagogically valuable manner; and where a portion (institutionally defined) of face-to-face time is replaced by online activity (p. 10). It is worth noting that complementary has crept into the conceptualisation of blended learning as proposed by Picciano (2009). That is, the online activity is meant to complement a portion of the face-to-face instruction and not to replace it. In this article, we follow this line of thought and agree with Rajaram (2021) when he wrote:

In blended learning, classroom time between instructors and students is not substituted by online delivery. Instead, the online component comprises content and activities that complement in-class lessons. It usually involves online resources such as online journals, quizzes, voice-overs and/or audio podcasts, interactive games, and videos. Learners can access these online resources from anywhere and they are usually delivered through a university-wide learning management system, blogs, or contextualised learning systems. The important point to understand about the blended approach is that traditional learning has not been replaced by online learning; rather, the two elements complement each other to provide learners with an inclusive and holistic learning experience (p. 29).

After this brief exposition of various conceptualisations of blended learning, we now turn theoretical rationale for investigating blended learning as a promising method of teaching in higher education.

Theoretical foundations of blended learning

Researchers have used different theories to rationalise blended learning and justify the relationships between their research constructs. The use of these different theoretical foundations is expected since there is no consensus on conceptualisation of blended learning among the researchers and their research goals are not the same. For instance, Bazelais and Doleck (2018b) used constructivism to justify the use of blended learning as a pedagogical approach and argued for the expected effect of blended learning on students’ performance in Physics. Viewing blended learning as a complex teaching approach that encompasses participants, technological tools, and the environment, Evenhouse et al. (2023) used actor-network theory to rationalise blended learning and justify the expected relationships between their research constructs among engineering students. In addition, Liu et al. (2024) reported a comprehensive list of theories that can be used to provide an empirical basis for blended learning and its implementations in education. They did this by drawing on previous studies on blended learning and extracting the theoretical foundations of these studies in a systematic and coherent way. These theories include behaviourism, cognitivism, curriculum theory, activity theory, and community of enquiry.

We acknowledge that some of these theories may be appropriate to justify the use of blended learning in higher education. However, we challenge their applicability to the modern breed of participants, technological tools, and environmental forces that characterise higher education institutions. This is because these theories were developed when educational technologies have not been this popular in higher education. Thus, we deem it necessary to leave these theories behind and justify the use of blended learning in this study using connectivism. Dissatisfied with theories that suppress the role of technologies in the learning process for activities within individuals, Siemens (2005) proposed connectivism as a rational explanation of learning in a digital age where activities (information processing, storing, and retrieval) that were previously ascribed to humans are now performed by technologies. Connectivism posits that learning is actionable knowledge that “can reside outside of ourselves (within an organisation or a database), is focused on connecting specialised information sets, and the connections that enable us to learn more are more important than our current state of knowing” (Siemens, 2005, p. 5).

According to connectivism, the foundation of learning lies in the multitude of perspectives and the interlinking of specialised communities, fields, ideas, and other sources of information to address real-world problems. The cultivation and sustenance of these networked connections are imperative to facilitate an ongoing learning journey, with a fundamental skill being the discernment of connections between people, digital artefacts, and various domains, ideas, and concepts (Anderson and Dron, 2011; Siemens, 2005). This networked connection of people, technologies, and content makes connectivism especially attractive for rationalising blended learning in higher education. In this context, participants interact with themselves, they interact with technological tools, and they interact with the learning content while interchanging their roles in the network.

Researchers (e.g., Van De Heyde and Siebrits, 2019; Vas et al., 2018) have consistently leveraged openness, connectedness, diversity, autonomy, and the belief that learning takes place in non-human media as postulated by connectivism to design blended learning environments and digital education. For instance, Van De Heyde and Siebrits (2019) designed and implemented a blended learning course using the principles of connectivism and found that students’ attitudes towards learning Physics improved and their perceptions of online learning were positive. In another study, Azar et al. (2021) found that a blended learning course designed on the framework of connectivism enhanced students’ collaborative skills and autonomy. In addition, students reported high satisfaction with the learning experience corroborating earlier reports by Van De Heyde and Siebrits (2019). The findings of these empirical studies reinforced theoretical studies (e.g., Al-Mutairi and Bin Mubayrik, 2021; Goldie, 2016; Tschofen and Mackness, 2012) that argued for the potential of connectivism as a framework for enhancing students’ learning experiences in a digital age. Building on the findings of these previous studies, we argue that connectivism provides a theoretical basis for designing and implementing our blended learning course through which increased learning engagement, high motivation, and students’ positive attitudes and satisfaction are envisaged.

Materials and methods

Research context

This study took place in a federal government-owned university in the Northern part of Nigeria. The focus was to revolutionise a traditionally taught course in line with the digitalisation of education in higher institutions in Nigeria. The course (Information and Communication Technology—ICT in Education) is a compulsory course for all third-year students following a programme in Science Education at the university. The course covers basic introduction to ICT, telecommunication, internet and intranet, multimedia, virtual reality, and their applications in education. Before this research, the course was taught using the lecture method, where lecturers dictate lesson notes while students write with pen and paper. The assessment comprised a mid-semester examination and a final examination with or without assignments during the semester. Following the Resource-Activity-Support-Evaluation (RASE) pedagogical model (Churchill et al., 2013), we redesigned the course by integrating both face-to-face physical classroom lessons with online learning in a meaningful way. This integration was done such that we alternated between face-to-face and online classrooms every week throughout the semester. As such, we used a 50–50 blended learning approach in the course. The resources (the first pillar of the RASE model) we used in the course involved electronic lesson notes, video lessons, a university e-learning platform (Moodle), and Microsoft Office Suite. The activities (the second pillar of the RASE model) in the course comprised an enquiry-based physical classroom, collaborative learning, students’ multimedia project assignments on assigned topics, and virtual interactive sessions through Moodle. The support (the third pillar of the RASE model) aspect of the course involved free office consultations, social interactions through Moodle, email communication, and scaffolding during physical lessons. The evaluation (the fourth pillar of the RASE model) was in four parts and comprised of formative feedback, physical micro-teaching, multimedia video submission, and a final examination. For the physical micro-teaching, we grouped the pre-service teachers into groups of three persons and assigned a topic to each group from the secondary school Basic Science syllabus. Then, each group designed a lesson plan, taught the topic in class, and the researcher evaluated their lessons. Further, the students made a video lesson on the assigned topic and submitted the multimedia video as part of the evaluation in the course. We integrated these pillars of the RASE model (as summarised in Fig. 1) to carefully design and implement the blended learning version of the course.

Fig. 1: RASE pedagogical model.
figure 1

Adapted from “Integrating learning design, interactivity, and technology,” by Churchill et al. (2013), a paper presented at the ASCILITE—Australian Society for Computers in Learning in Tertiary Education Annual Conference, p. 140.

Full size image

Participants

The population of this study comprised 163 undergraduate third-year students who followed ICT in Education in the first semester of the 2023/2024 academic session. There were 102 females and 61 males, with an average age of 23 years. That was their first experience in a blended learning course since they enrolled in a science teacher education programme at the university. From this population, we purposively (Creswell and Creswell, 2017) selected nine pre-service teachers based on activeness in class, prior academic achievements, punctuality, and informed consent to participate in this research. We envisaged that by interviewing pre-service teachers who satisfy these four criteria we can capture the affordances and the constraints of the blended learning course. In other words, if this set of pre-service teachers acknowledges an affordance of the blended learning course, it means the affordance is worth it. On the contrary, the challenges encountered by this set of pre-service teachers require urgent attention. Moreover, the selected sample size is appropriate for this as it is beyond the recommended range of three to eight participants by Braun and Clarke (2013) to avoid saturation of information. Following the principle of a qualitative research design for data collection, these nine pre-service teachers were interviewed (Braun and Clarke, 2013).

Data collection

Data collection involved semi-structured interviews with the selected pre-service teachers which was done by one of the authors of this article. It is important to remark that we made some efforts to minimise the influence of the interviewer on students’ responses to the interview questions. Before the interview, the interviewer had established a conducive and inclusive relationship with the pre-service teachers, which gave them the confidence to express themselves without any fear of favour or punishment. In addition, the pre-service teachers were reminded that their responses to the interview questions would not affect their performance in the course. Further, the pre-service teachers were mature enough to form and take responsibility for their opinions about the course. The interviewer engaged in conversations with the pre-service teachers regarding the scope of the research and its relevance, not only to the institution but also to the broader economy, using an interview guide. The interview guide focuses on gathering valuable insights into participants’ perspectives on blended learning, their approaches to learning, the availability and utilisation of learning resources and technology, challenges faced in learning, and recommendations for improvement. To ensure the validity and reliability of the interview guide, the interview guide was scrutinised and validated by two experienced researchers in qualitative research within the institution. The semi-structured interview lasted for an average of 30 min for each participant and their responses were recorded using a playback audio recorder. We then transcribed the recorded responses verbatim and prepared the generated data for analysis.

Data analysis

We analysed the generated data using thematic analysis as propagated by Braun et al. (2019). We argue that thematic analysis is an appropriate method of analysing our generated data since we aimed to critically examine each response of participating pre-service teachers and establish cross-cutting meanings (themes) that sufficiently capture their perceptions of the blended learning course. Thus, we define a theme in this study as “a pattern of shared meaning, organised around a core concept or idea” (Braun et al., 2019, p. 845). This conceptualisation necessitates discovering underlying shared meanings in participants’ responses rather than establishing domain summaries as proposed by some researchers (e.g., Guest et al., 2012) in thematic analysis. Therefore, our coding process and product are independent of any pre-determined codebook and carried out in a non-linear manner of coding, recoding, and reflecting to discover the shared meanings. We present the findings of this analytical process in the next section. It is crucial to remark that the theoretical foundation of this study (connectivism) informs the thematic analysis by guiding us to focus on themes related to the networked nature of learning in a blended environment. This approach allows us to clarify how pre-service teachers’ connections within the learning environment impact their learning experiences, revealing the affordances and constraints they encountered while following the blended learning course.

Results

The results of the thematic analysis revealed some interesting findings. To address the general research question: What are pre-service STEM teachers’ perceptions of blended learning? We present these findings under three broad emerging themes from our analysis. These themes are the affordances, challenges/constraints, and prospects of blended learning in higher education.

Affordances of blended learning

Taking some insights from the literature (e.g., Anderson and Robey, 2017), we conceptualise affordances of blended learning as personal and social goal-oriented actions that emerge from a dynamic interaction between pre-service STEM teachers and technologies while following our blended learning course. These goal-oriented actions include knowledge gained, skills, and attitudinal change that were perceived and actualised by pre-service teachers as they experienced the blended learning course.

Increased motivation to learn

The first affordance of the blended learning course was an exposition of several educational technologies that have contributed to pre-service teachers’ motivation to learn. 89% of the interviewed pre-service teachers claimed they were motivated to study because of the blended learning approach used in teaching the course. One of the pre-service teachers attributed his motivation to the hands-on experience he gained through the multimedia project assignments on assigned topics involved in the organisation of the course. He said that:

It motivated me as I told you I want to even start using this on PowerPoint to do podcasts, so it motivated me to do many things because I have got to experience hands-on, I can do the video myself now.

Another pre-service teacher mentioned that the blended learning course made her realise the importance of some electronic gadgets and applications she possessed. She said that:

Yes, it motivates me to study…. So, I like the fact that it is when you research, you learn. It is definite. So, during the process of researching, it was learning, and it was motivating, and I think motivating in the aspect of using your gadgets. A lot of educationists do not use gadgets, they just feel you go to class, do your lecture, and submit your assignments but this course made it possible for us to be familiar with our gadgets, like using our phones to get our materials, to get to your Moodle, to research. So yes, it motivated me a lot.

The findings revealed that blended learning affords pre-service teachers the opportunity to use a variety of technological tools such as Moodle, and Microsoft PowerPoint for making video lessons, and the internet for surfing educational resources. This affordance made their learning experience more interesting and enhanced their motivation to learn. Hence, the increased motivation that students experience in blended learning courses can lead to improved learning outcomes and a positive attitude toward learning.

Changes in study approaches

Another crucial affordance of blended learning was its influence on the pre-service teachers’ approaches to learning. The course not only motivates the pre-service teachers but also changes the ways they go about their learning towards developing conceptual knowledge. For instance, one of the participants said:

Yeah, it motivates me to study because I love anything that has to do with ICT and all, but this course has made me feel like, wow, let me study more. I can do this in some of my courses. I am thinking about converting some of my courses to videos, some bulky courses, to summarise them into video presentations and use them to study. So, the course has affected the way I want to study.

In addition, another student said:

It affects me positively in the sense that I did not even know that there is an existence of anything called Moodle where you can go and look for your course and see the names of the lecturers to click on the specific course that you want to and see everything about that course. Seriously, it is because of this course that I know that there is something of this kind. Seriously, it is because of this course. If not because of this course I will not know what to say about Moodle.

Improved attitudes and interest

The opportunity that blended learning affords also includes the promotion of positive attitudes among the pre-service teachers, which is a key component that promotes learning. All the participants welcomed the new organisation of the course positively, they expressed that it was a whole new and interesting experience. For instance, one pre-service mentioned:

I had like a whole new experience making the video. Like, you know when you do something, you constantly do something you just want to give up, but the video, the fact that you have to just do it to get it right, so I think that was like my motivation, my driving force, like to keep me to like to get it right, like don’t give up.

In addition to this explanation, another participant said:

Well, my experience, like in the long run was interesting like I got to connect with my colleagues. I got to like to overcome my stage fright. I even got to know what before now I didn’t know that I could do. Whenever I see all these YouTube videos, I feel like ok, you need all these like super tech something to do this. I don’t know if I can do it with my laptop. I like to explore, let’s say a little bit to know some things and to like to achieve my potential innovation in a way.

Personalised learning and collaboration

From the findings of this study, it was revealed that blended learning allows for a personalised learning experience, where pre-service teachers work at their own pace and focus on areas where they need more support. For instance, one of the participants said:

I prefer to instead of using the PDF, I prefer to use the video to read because I don’t like PDF. So, I prefer to print a PDF to read it. But the video has actually helped me. Like I saw that last night before I slept, I watched it like as if I was watching a movie. Then I still watched it again and I could remember some things that were actually said, and I knew that OK with what had been said, I could actually write a test or exam as soon as I woke up that day.

As pre-service teachers learn at their own pace, blended learning simultaneously provides opportunities for them to collaborate and share ideas. For instance, one of the participants said:

This organisation made me get closer to some of my colleagues because my group members, I’m not close to them. I don’t know them, especially one, that was my first time knowing her name.

Another pre-service teacher also mentioned that the organisation of the course made them to use their gadgets and resources effectively and collaboratively. They did not need to meet physically all the time to work together, they did most of the work virtually, as one of them said:

Everything was actually done online. We never met physically till the day we wanted to do, wanted to present in class. Every work we did, we did it online, no need of say, OK, you come, let’s meet so and so time.

With an online component of blended learning, pre-service teachers can participate in training at their pace and on their schedule, which can be particularly beneficial for students who have other commitments, such as work or family responsibilities. This flexibility is key in blended learning which can enhance the personalised learning experience of the pre-service teachers. By taking advantage of the opportunities provided by blended learning, pre-service teachers can improve their learning outcomes and develop important skills that will benefit them in the future.

Constraints of blended learning

In this study, we conceptualise constraints as factors that hinder pre-service teachers from actualising the affordances of the blended learning course. Following some insights from the literature (e.g., Anderson and Robey, 2017), we acknowledge that not all emerged and perceived affordances can be actualised. This is because the actualisation of affordances is dependent on the absence of constraints. These constraints can impact the effectiveness of blended learning and should be addressed to ensure a positive learning experience for students. Through the thematic analysis of our generated data, we found some constraints to implementing the blended learning course among pre-service STEM teachers. We present these constraints in subsequent sections.

Technology difficulties

One of the major constraints of blended learning is technology issues, including inadequate training and technology problems. These issues can impact the effectiveness of blended learning and should be addressed to ensure a positive learning experience for students. For instance, a participant explained:

Also, the challenge I faced was network issues. That one is very common, especially when you are in the class and maybe it escaped your mind to check Moodle for the topic we’re treating. Then you know trying to log in the network has gone blank. You just have to wait. Ok, maybe is it the server or is it something else? So, the main issues I had were those network issues.

During the blended learning course, the challenge associated with working as a group is such that it may be taxing for students to navigate through the online interface as a group or interact with one another on a task, especially when some members of the group are not as versatile as the others in terms of computer proficiency. One of the participants stated:

I had some difficulties being that I’m not very knowledgeable in this computer stuff and all this thing. So, to submit was quite challenging. I followed the instructions and then when I submitted it, I didn’t see the stuff. I had to call one of my group members to submit it.

Another pre-service teacher shared his experience as follows:

Yes, another and biggest challenge I faced was the video part. Being the group leader, I faced a lot of challenges because I was always worried. I’m always thinking of how to do my video. I don’t have a system. I’m always looking for one person or the other to help me. Now during the break, I will talk to someone. Please come to school come and help me and I will go to school. We sit down, we do the video, everything. You still have to like to communicate and making the video alone is not easy.

Inadequate facilities

Another set of constraints concerned with factors not related to the pre-service teachers but to facilities available at their disposal. For instance, one of the participants said:

Let’s say time factor because I had to meet each and every one of them. Then let’s say electricity, the network issue and me not having the personal computer to use for the work, so those are the only challenges.

In support of this inadequate facility, another participant mentioned:

Like, one of the challenges I faced and it’s stopping me from doing my work right now. It is the technology because I don’t have a laptop, so from time like the one I used to do my typing, I have to like after helping others to do their own, I will be like let me borrow their system.

Prospects of blended learning in higher education

Despite the constraints associated with the blended learning course, the pre-service teachers acknowledge some potential or prospects of the course. This includes gaining knowledge about modern technologies for effective learning, preparing them for digitalised instruction and allowing them to engage in self-directed learning. According to the pre-service teachers, the blended learning course was challenging but eventually resulted in improved skills. For instance, one of them said:

Overall, this course offered a lot of new opportunities, but it wasn’t without its challenges. Learning new tech is always tough, especially for those who are less experienced. But that’s how we learn, we try new things to gain skills, and that’ll help us face the world. Overall, it was difficult but valuable.

To corroborate this point, another pre-service teacher mentioned:

The course provided us with a great opportunity to learn and get comfortable with using technology, like Moodle. It made the course more accessible and eliminated the need to ask questions about how to submit assignments or access materials.

Blended learning accommodates the teaching and learning for sustainability which prepares the students to learn now and for the future. One of the pre-service teachers said:

The integration of ICT into education is an exciting development, especially for future educators like us. This course showed us that there are many different ways to teach and get to know students. ICT opens up so many possibilities and makes education more engaging and effective for us.

The use of technology in the course provided an opportunity to develop a better understanding of the subject matter, as it allowed for self-directed learning and decision-making. According to the responses of the pre-service teachers, it helps to promote independence and decision-making skills and, more importantly, provides an opportunity to develop a positive learning experience. One of the pre-service teachers explained:

The course helped me gain independence and decision-making skills because I had to take the initiative to access resources like the Internet and email.

Overall, the course was positive—it encouraged participation, research, and communication skills. However, the feedback process could’ve been improved by having a panel of evaluators, as individual feedback could be perceived as overly critical.

Discussion

The advancement in ICT has revolutionised activities across all facets of human endeavours, including education. Blended learning is an evolving educational method, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa. This study is pioneering research on investigating pre-service teachers’ perceptions of a blended learning course at our university. Through a carefully designed qualitative method of data generation and analysis, this study revealed some interesting findings. We found that pre-service teachers were fascinated with the blended course and reported positive perceptions of the new organisation of the course despite some highlighted challenges, such as technical problems and unstable internet connectivity. This finding resonates with López-Pérez et al. (2011), who found that students had positive perceptions of the blended learning environment. Still, slow internet connectivity and lack of internet access for some pre-service teachers outside the university campus hindered the effectiveness of the blended learning environment. Further, we found that blended learning afforded pre-service teachers with exposure to various ICT resources that can be used for learning. This fosters their motivation to use the ICT tools for personalised learning and widens the development of their conceptual knowledge. This finding is in tandem with the assertion made by Alammary et al. (2014) that blended learning is an effective approach that adds value to the learning environment through the incorporation of online teaching resources. Similarly, Attard and Holmes (2022) in their study also asserted that technology use with traditional teaching expanded the students opportunities to engage with learning through the provision of multiple pathways. They further found that blended learning afforded students the opportunities to learn at their own pace and engage with tasks that are suited to their academic abilities (Attard and Holmes, 2022).

The findings revealed that the blended learning course led to improved motivation, attitudes, and interest in the learning contents. We envisage improved performance in the course following these reported positive affective factors that enhance learning. In addition to improved affective factors, the blended learning course offered the opportunity to adopt approaches to learning that necessitate curiosity and problem-solving skills. This finding corroborates the report by Zavalevskyi et al. (2023), who claimed that combining physical and virtual learning environments enhanced students’ learning experience. It is quite interesting that blended learning served two sides of a sword with its promotion of personalised learning and collaboration. The provision of recorded video lessons, electronic lesson notes, and PowerPoint slides offered the pre-service teachers the opportunity to learn at their pace in the blended learning course. This finding is in line with Attard and Holmes (2022) who indicated that students were able to learn at their own pace due to the use of blended learning strategies as it offered the opportunities to either re-visit prior learning or move forward with extension activities. On the other hand, the group micro-teaching, as well as the multimedia video projects assigned to the pre-service teachers, offered the opportunity for collaboration and cooperation in this course. This finding corroborates the increased collaboration and peer-to-peer interaction ascribed to blended learning by Sun et al. (2017).

Similar to the study by Bazelais and Doleck (2018b), the findings also showed that the blended learning course helped to promote independence and decision-making skills and, more importantly, provided an opportunity for pre-service teachers to have a positive learning experience. Despite these affordances of blended learning, the findings revealed some constraints that hindered the actualisations of the affordances. Notable among these constraints are unstable internet network issues, lack of basic computer proficiency, inability to navigate and interact through the online interface when used as a group, unstable or epileptic power supply, and lack of access to personal computers. Following some insights from the literature (e.g., Orji et al., 2021), we acknowledged that these constraints can be ascribed to both personal and institutional sources. Some of these constraints are expected as the university is government-owned with many of its students from low to middle-economic status backgrounds. Looking beyond these constraints, we realised that the affordances of blended learning overshadowed its constraints. This is because the perceptions of the pre-service teachers are that the blended learning course paved their way to gain wide access to educational tools, develop positive affective constructs, adopt deep approaches to learning, develop conceptual understanding, promote self-directed learning, and enhance decision-making skills.

Conclusions

Blended learning is a promising instructional method in higher education with enormous potential for effective teaching and learning. This study echoes and fits into the body of literature (e.g., Attard and Holmes, 2022; Bazelais et al., 2022; Keržič et al., 2019; Liu et al., 2024; Zavalevskyi et al., 2023) that reported the affordances and constraints of the blended learning approach in the teaching and learning process. We acknowledge that harnessing the potential of blended learning and overcoming its constraints requires careful planning and design of the course. Stakeholders and researchers should be aware of and diligently prepare for this before embarking on a blended learning course. From our experience with this blended learning course and interaction with the pre-service teachers, we suggest developing a clear framework for designing and implementing a blended learning course. The students should be aware of this framework through a pre-course seminar in the form of an orientation programme. This framework will provide students with an overview of the course structure, expectations, and resources available to them. Another key recommendation is a careful selection of a blended learning model and digital tools to be incorporated with face-to-face classes. These digital tools should align with the learning outcomes of the course and be within the reach of both teachers and students with deliberate effort to ensure operational capability. Regardless of the chosen model of blended learning, we recommended an adequate provision for deep engagement with learning contents and peer-to-peer interaction of the students either virtually or physically. Following these recommendations, the potential of blended learning may be fully actualised.

To conclude, we acknowledge that this study has some limitations. For instance, we did not account for socioeconomic factors, such as unstable internet and lack of resources, which may affect the engagement and outcomes of pre-service STEM teachers in the blended learning course. Also, the short-term focus of the study may limit its ability to assess the long-term effects of blended learning on pre-service teachers’ professional development. This may leave the sustainability of skills and attitudes of the pre-service STEM teachers unexplored. Finally, the study did not thoroughly evaluate the effectiveness of various collaborative tools, which may overlook the roles of these tools in enhancing peer interaction and maximising engagement in blended learning courses. However, these limitations offer opportunities for future research in the field. For instance, future research could explore the impact of socioeconomic factors on blended learning, focusing on how challenges like unstable internet and lack of resources affect engagement and outcomes. Another direction is to evaluate the long-term effects of blended learning on pre-service STEM teachers’ professional development, assessing sustained skills and attitudes. Furthermore, studies could investigate the effectiveness of various collaborative tools in enhancing peer interaction and learning in blended environments. This will aid the identification of best practices for maximising learning engagement in blended learning courses.