Last month I had the opportunity to attended a Center for Teaching session on “Designing Hybrid Courses” given by Pamela Trafford, Senior Lecturer in the School of Management, and seasoned veteran of online teaching. In this session, she provided advice on best practices for teaching hybrid courses; courses that meet face-to-face, but also make use of Web tools (such as SPARK) to deliver course content and activities.
How are Hybrid Courses like Online Courses?
Trafford started her presentation by reflecting on her experience teaching exclusively online courses, and how that changed the way she would use technology in her face to face courses. When using a tool like SPARK there is a tendency to use it simply as a repository for documents. Content is organized by type (lecture slides, assignments, etc.) rather than by topic (Lecture 1, Unit 2 etc). Her use of SPARK for in-person classes tended to be more ad-hoc, whereas the nature of online teaching had always required significantly more planning ahead. Trafford found that her online courses ran more smoothly when content was organized by topics and deadlines; and ultimately that organization scheme works best for students in both online and hybrid courses.
Trafford also stressed the importance of discussing teaching strategies with colleagues, and the benefits she has gained from sharing how these tools can be used with colleagues: “One of the best things about working with other online instructors in the School of Management is I’m lucky enough to see other instructors courses, the innovative and creative things they are trying … We talk about things that work for them and things that don’t work for them.”
Planning and Structuring a Course
In designing a useful hybrid course, Trafford stressed the importance of planning and consistency; “Have a plan and stick to it – don’t change the rules in the middle of the semester.” Over time, her use of Web tools in face-to-face courses has grown. Rather than simply posting collections of files, Trafford has begun to try out tools she first used in online teaching, such as discussion boards. By using these tools, she “creates a course that is not only more efficient in terms of making use of student time outside of class, but more effective.”
Trafford continued to reiterate that planning and structure are critical to a successful hybrid course. She advised instructors to consider organizing their material by topics rather than by the type of resources it happen to be (i.e. keep your materials for Week 1 together instead of separated into videos vs. handouts). In addition to making it easier for students to find what they need, an organized course is easier to update and maintain each semester. When instructors start using tools like SPARK, there is a tendency to just throw everything on the home page, but organizational tools like folders and Learning Modules help keep the site free of clutter.
Different Tools for Different Instructors
Most online learning tools provide a range of tools for different teaching strategies. Pam Trafford described her initial uses of SPARK as being for assessment purposes, but has slowly incorporated more lecture-type material. Other instructors at this session discussed their use of SPARK for discussion activities, writing activities, and review material. Use of online tools seemed to vary significantly based on teaching style, topic, and student interest.
Of particular interest to Trafford was the potential of these tools for delivering supplemental materials: “one of the benefits is being able to include review and background material for students who need it, the stuff you’re focusing on, and then extra material for students who want to go above and beyond.” Using SPARK in this way has the potential to reach students with different learning styles.
Choosing What to Deliver Online
Many instructors like to use SPARK for moving administrative activities online and freeing up time in class. This can include simple things like announcements, but also surveys, posting grades, and collecting papers. Posting all of the grades via SPARK is convenient for the students and also keeps them more aware of their progress in the course, Trafford said: “when they see those 3 zeroes in a row they are suddenly interested and they change things … putting it on screen makes it more transparent.”
According to Trafford some tools simply work better online. She discussed the power of automatically-graded assessments for providing instant feedback, practices and review activities, and appealing to different styles of learning. Trafford provides quizzes that let students prepare for lectures, review background material, and work through activities where intermediate hints are useful.
Trafford likes to use SPARK for collecting assignments as well. Even though she still prints out papers to mark them up, she sees value in having students submit electronic copies: “I like to grade hard copies, but even if I’m getting a hard copy I like them to post an electronic copy I can keep.”
The discussion tools in SPARK can also be useful for communication and student interaction, Trafford said: “I started to feel like I know my online students better because there was so much interaction and communication.” There are many different strategies for starting up online discussions, Trafford discussed how she likes to creates a student lounge area for students to interact informally and also encourages students to use the discussion area to introduce themselves to their classmates. Trafford also likes to use discussion areas for classes where she assigns groups as place for students to collaborate. The group of attendees at the event discussed the challenges of managing online discussions and different models for dealing with it; including using teaching assistants for help. Trafford concluded that “no matter what, it takes time, but it is a way to add a lot of quality to a course.”
Recently, Trafford has begun putting lecture-type content online using a program called Camtasia to generate “screencasts,” narrated videos of Trafford presenting PowerPoint slides or working through examples in pieces of software like Excel. She started with doing these for the topics students struggled with the most and sees a lot of value in it: “the students who need to hear it 3 times, can.”
Online learning systems like SPARK provide a wide range of tools, Trafford concluded that there are many ways one can use the in your teaching but the decisions are up to you: “What you put online and what you keep in the classroom will vary widely based on what’s best for you and your students … [these tools have] great potential, you just have to find out what works for you.”