Hybrid and Blended Classes: Counting the Ways

[downer]

It looks like many fall classes will be labelled "hybrid" or "blended."

I've taught lots of classroom classes and lots of online classes. But never a hybrid class.

I've searched online for best practices, which are useful, though I wonder how well past experience with hybrid classes will extend to the fall with a different student population.

Right now it seems that hybrid could mean all sorts of different things.

As I've said on other threads, I'm thinking that I will be basically design online classes with a tutorial element in the classroom. I've wanted to explore "flipped classrooms" in the past and this might be my opportunity.

But it would be useful to get some sense of what variety of approaches are possible.

What good or bad experiences have others had with hybrid classes?

[sprout]

In sciences, 'hybrid' often means that all classroom instruction is done online and students come to campus only for labs and exams.  I've done this for a while, and have moved towards asking more conceptual questions on labs and doing reviews at the beginning of lab time.

In general, I think a well-designed hybrid class would look a lot like a well-designed online class, with the added element of in-person reviews/discussions/tutorials/small group work/whatever makes the most sense for your class or discipline.

[Ruralguy]

Definitely use it as an opportunity to train them into using as many online resources as possible, just in case everything goes all online again. That is, don't have them hand in paper, have them submit to the CMS, etc..

For some classes in my discipline this would indeed reflect some of the ways people are already flipping classrooms. Many intro physics profs put traditional lectures online, and in person time is only used for "mini-lectures" of a few minutes just to summarize techniques by doing problems, and then most of the rest of the class time goes into group work and tutorials for solving problems and understanding concepts.

[Puget]

I'll be following this thread with interest since that is also the direction we seem to be heading for all. I'm signed up for hybrid teaching training in June, so I'll report back what I learn. I too have been curious about flipping my big lecture class, but heard about how much work this was for colleagues and so have held off, so perhaps if I have to do it this fall and it goes well I'll stick with it.

[arcturus]

In the pre-COVID world at my institution, "hybrid" meant that part of the course was online and part of the course met in person. Usually, the lectures were online and the "discussion section" component met in person, but I have seen examples done the other way as well.  This is not usually considered a flipped classroom, since there are fewer hours of in person instruction in a hybrid course.

In the post-COVID world at my institution, "hybrid" probably will retain the above designation, but "blended" courses will have online options for portions of the class (the most common example is that 1/3 of the students are in person on Monday; 1/3 of the students are in person on Wednesday; 1/3 of the students are in person on Friday; the other 2/3 are online for the days they are not in person). Personally, I think this will be a disaster. Remote-taught classes scheduled as synchronous zoom meetings largely worked (to the extent that they did) because everyone was tied to the computer so the audio quality and visual presentations (if any) were of reasonable quality. If you are now trying to capture an in person class with 2/3 of the students not present, it will be difficult to guarantee good audio (are the in person students speaking into their computers/phones too?) or visual (is someone providing a live video feed?). This seems like a way to exacerbate the worst components of both online and in person teaching, since students will not have the benefit of well designed online instruction, nor a full complement of face-to-face interactions.

[the_geneticist]

In the pre-COVID world at my institution, "hybrid" meant that part of the course was online and part of the course met in person. Usually, the lectures were online and the "discussion section" component met in person, but I have seen examples done the other way as well.  This is not usually considered a flipped classroom, since there are fewer hours of in person instruction in a hybrid course.

In the post-COVID world at my institution, "hybrid" probably will retain the above designation, but "blended" courses will have online options for portions of the class (the most common example is that 1/3 of the students are in person on Monday; 1/3 of the students are in person on Wednesday; 1/3 of the students are in person on Friday; the other 2/3 are online for the days they are not in person). Personally, I think this will be a disaster. Remote-taught classes scheduled as synchronous zoom meetings largely worked (to the extent that they did) because everyone was tied to the computer so the audio quality and visual presentations (if any) were of reasonable quality. If you are now trying to capture an in person class with 2/3 of the students not present, it will be difficult to guarantee good audio (are the in person students speaking into their computers/phones too?) or visual (is someone providing a live video feed?). This seems like a way to exacerbate the worst components of both online and in person teaching, since students will not have the benefit of well designed online instruction, nor a full complement of face-to-face interactions.

The logistics of rotating students sounds awful too!  I know we'd have students who would be mad that they CAN'T be there in person every day and we'd have students who would be mad that they SHOULD be there in person one day a week.  I don't see an easy way to enforce this either unless your class was already really small so you'd know who was allowed to be there on each day. 
Our administration made some noises about running labs like this (1/3 of the class at a time).  But our teaching labs are all fully booked 8:00am-10:00pm every day.  There isn't enough time or space or enough instructors to rotate students and get them all in the lab every week.  We certainly can't give full credit for only doing 1/3 of the lab work.
I think a qualification to be a dean must be a complete lack of the reality of space and time constraints. 

[sprout]

In the post-COVID world at my institution, "hybrid" probably will retain the above designation, but "blended" courses will have online options for portions of the class (the most common example is that 1/3 of the students are in person on Monday; 1/3 of the students are in person on Wednesday; 1/3 of the students are in person on Friday; the other 2/3 are online for the days they are not in person). Personally, I think this will be a disaster.

I could only really see this working if it were done with a flipped-classroom model:  All lectures online, and students come one day a week in smaller groups for recitation/tutorial/discussion/lab.  Although then you might still get into faculty workload issues.

[arcturus]

In the post-COVID world at my institution, "hybrid" probably will retain the above designation, but "blended" courses will have online options for portions of the class (the most common example is that 1/3 of the students are in person on Monday; 1/3 of the students are in person on Wednesday; 1/3 of the students are in person on Friday; the other 2/3 are online for the days they are not in person). Personally, I think this will be a disaster.

I could only really see this working if it were done with a flipped-classroom model:  All lectures online, and students come one day a week in smaller groups for recitation/tutorial/discussion/lab.  Although then you might still get into faculty workload issues.

I believe your example would be considered a hybrid class, with 3 separate discussion sections. That requires extra instructional time per student, as the 3 discussion sections are replicating content/experience. The example of rotating the in-person individuals retains the nominal instructional time per student, as every student is expected to attend the scheduled meetings, just who is actually in the room changes on each day of the week.

Regardless, all of these "new" modes of instruction will require additional work by faculty to make certain that students have positive educational experiences in these unusual times.

[Puget]

In the post-COVID world at my institution, "hybrid" probably will retain the above designation, but "blended" courses will have online options for portions of the class (the most common example is that 1/3 of the students are in person on Monday; 1/3 of the students are in person on Wednesday; 1/3 of the students are in person on Friday; the other 2/3 are online for the days they are not in person). Personally, I think this will be a disaster.

I could only really see this working if it were done with a flipped-classroom model:  All lectures online, and students come one day a week in smaller groups for recitation/tutorial/discussion/lab.  Although then you might still get into faculty workload issues.

I believe this is likely to be the model for large classes here, so we can keep students spread out in the lecture halls for discussion once a week, with the lectures asynchronous online. Classroom time for faculty will be the same, but indeed the actual work will be more since we'll have to record all the lectures on top of that. Still, I think it could end up working fairly well.

[downer]

My approach to how much work I do is that my resources are limited: if I have to learn a new platform, or do a lot more prep, then that leaves less time for something else. I don't spend more time total on the course.

Ideally, if there is repetition from one semester to the next, then I can be more efficient with each iteration, so I am able to enrich what I do each time.

That will apply equally for this fall.

[spork]

[. . .]

What good or bad experiences have others had with hybrid classes?

Disclaimer: I have never taught a course that is officially labeled as hybrid (defined by my employer as basically "almost entirely online with a few in-person classroom sessions during the semester"), but given how much interaction my students have with the LMS, I'm familiar with the concept.

1. You cannot underestimate the lack of technological proficiency of some students. Make it clear to students that technical problems have to be directed at tech support staff, not you, because you can't crawl through the Intertubes to see what they are doing or not doing.

2. Force students to familiarize themselves with the syllabus and the structure of the course at the beginning of the semester with an open-syllabus/open-LMS quiz that counts toward the final grade. Respond with "see page 2 of the syllabus" after that.

3. The subject that is burning up online conversations among faculty developers/instructional designers right now is "How do you teach using active learning methods in which groups of students collaborate with each other synchronously, as they would in the pre-Covid-19 physical classroom?" Too many universities are assuming that "teaching" equals "instructor lecturing at the front of the room" and their solution, which will be implemented over the summer, is outfitting every classroom with a camera and a lapel microphone to livestream lectures to the students who invariably will not be physically present. Well, sorry, that's not something that needs to be livestreamed and it shouldn't be the sole thing that happens in a physical classroom whether or not there is a pandemic.

[mamselle]

A friend sent this; I think some of the points are the same here.

   https://patch.com/massachusetts/boston/how-ma-colleges-universities-plan-reopen

M.

[the_geneticist]

Disclaimer: I have never taught a course that is officially labeled as hybrid (defined by my employer as basically "almost entirely online with a few in-person classroom sessions during the semester"), but given how much interaction my students have with the LMS, I'm familiar with the concept.

1. You cannot underestimate the lack of technological proficiency of some students. Make it clear to students that technical problems have to be directed at tech support staff, not you, because you can't crawl through the Intertubes to see what they are doing or not doing.

2. Force students to familiarize themselves with the syllabus and the structure of the course at the beginning of the semester with an open-syllabus/open-LMS quiz that counts toward the final grade. Respond with "see page 2 of the syllabus" after that.

3. The subject that is burning up online conversations among faculty developers/instructional designers right now is "How do you teach using active learning methods in which groups of students collaborate with each other synchronously, as they would in the pre-Covid-19 physical classroom?" Too many universities are assuming that "teaching" equals "instructor lecturing at the front of the room" and their solution, which will be implemented over the summer, is outfitting every classroom with a camera and a lapel microphone to livestream lectures to the students who invariably will not be physically present. Well, sorry, that's not something that needs to be livestreamed and it shouldn't be the sole thing that happens in a physical classroom whether or not there is a pandemic.

+1000 to all of these.  I'm dismayed that so many folks think that recording themselves talking through their slides is "the same" as their normal teaching.  Sadly, it really is with the exception that in a face-to-face class there is the slim possibility that a brave student will ask a question.  My department is so behind the times it's just depressing.

[marshwiggle]

  I'm dismayed that so many folks think that recording themselves talking through their slides is "the same" as their normal teaching.  Sadly, it really is with the exception that in a face-to-face class there is the slim possibility that a brave student will ask a question.  My department is so behind the times it's just depressing.

One funny example of this. Here, 7 students is the "magic number" to make a course have lectures. Below that it has to be an "independent study" course. The stipend for the lecture course with 7 students is $8000. The stipend for 6 students in the independent study is $1500.

Because "lecturing" is where all the work is!!!!

[HigherEd7]

  I'm dismayed that so many folks think that recording themselves talking through their slides is "the same" as their normal teaching.  Sadly, it really is with the exception that in a face-to-face class there is the slim possibility that a brave student will ask a question.  My department is so behind the times it's just depressing.

One funny example of this. Here, 7 students is the "magic number" to make a course have lectures. Below that it has to be an "independent study" course. The stipend for the lecture course with 7 students is $8000. The stipend for 6 students in the independent study is $1500.

Because "lecturing" is where all the work is!!!!

Very sad! It seems like they are trying to make money from the students and expect you to do the same work for an independent study with less pay...