IN-CLASS INTERACTIVE TEACHING APPROACH FOR FEMALE STUDENTS IN SOFTWARE ENGINEERING COURSES

Gender differences play a role in the volume of face-to-face interactions. While many researchers have concluded that females prefer written communication over spoken communication, this research study aims to explore the benefits and the pitfalls of adopting interactive teaching techniques against traditional teaching in courses that are taught solely to female students. In this work, an interactive teaching approach is implemented within a software engineering course over two cohorts of software engineering female students (2018 and 2019). The impact of the adopted technique is quantitatively evaluated through students' feedback and the instructor observations. Feedback from students show that interactive teaching could improve course learning outcomes and helped the instructor to achieve the course objectives. The instructor has observed that the adopted approach has helped female students to participate, engage, and be motivated during lectures. Recommendations are included in this paper for instructors who are teaching courses to female students that should impact positively on teaching and learning outcomes.