Hybrid Course

Hybrid Courses

The definition of a Hybrid course is as easily explained as an instruction that is delivered partially in a traditional lecture and part in an online environment. My eighth grade computer course this year was delivered as a Hybrid course. The first two weeks were the hardest, not for me but for the students, because the students were not use to the row of independent study. The students pushed and pleaded for information to be handed to them with me as the sage on stage. The favorite statement my students would say was “I don’t get it” when asked what they didn’t get they were unable to vocalize what it was they didn’t get, the truth was they didn’t want to do the work. This was a big issue with this year’s class. They were totally against having to read direction. I decided I needed to start slower with these students, but not to the point that I was an enabler. I found my techie students and lower end students loved the format. The techie students just breezed along from one topic to the next. I was able to give more one on one attention to the lower end students. I need to say my class is not a subject it is a how to use tools class that should be integrated into the core subjects and other encore classes, and the students already know this that is why I have a difficult time with students taking my class seriously. I find most of my time spent babysitting students that want to spend their time in my class playing games.
After reading the topic paragraph you might be saying to yourself why she is still saying we should offer Hybrid courses. I have seen the power of differential studies and offering your course as a Hybrid is just another way of differentiating the studies. Professor Brian McFarlin conducted an experiment with one of his classes, with the focus of observing the strengths and weakness of hybrid courses. As Brian McFarlin suggested to Meris Stansbury, the assistant Editor of eSchool News, the students’ grades improved by a whole letter grade or by 9.9 percent. Brian McFarlin states, “When I started, I just wanted to make sure that students did as well in the hybrid version of the class as the traditional. I quickly learned that technology is powerful when used properly.” Wow, with these numbers showing who wouldn’t want to try incorporating technology. First let me start by stating the study was done with college students and with 500 hundred students included in the study. They did not state whether they had a control group and doesn’t state what base line they used for the results.
Technology is a very strong tool and it is important to use the tool properly. I t will be essential to no longer spoon feed our students information, for them to thrive in the future as adults. Hybrid course can easily be put in place by using our Online Server (Moodle) and your already build curriculum. The students can be offered forums to state information or thoughts. To students this is like open mic night, many students that you don’t hear from in the traditional classroom you will hear from in the forum. Asking students to do different projects that are located on the online course, and offering links to videos that reinforces that topic are all pieces of the puzzle.
If you choose to try and build a Hybrid course, start slow, and just add few activities at a time. Eventually you will start finding other ways to add already built curriculum in a different format to your Hybrid course.
Sometimes it's the smallest decisions that can change your life forever.” Keri Russell