What’s in a Name? Unraveling the Nuances of K-12 Hybrid Learning

An item from the folks at the Digital Learning Collaborative.

By Kim Loomis, K-12 Educational Strategist at i3DigitalPD In the evolving landscape of K-12 education, the terminology we use to describe innovative learning models is more than mere semantics; it shapes perceptions, expectations, and outcomes. At the recent Digital Learning Annual Conference (DLAC), a recurring theme emerged: a palpable confusion surrounding the term “hybrid learning,” particularly when contrasted with “blended learning.” This distinction is not just academic—it’s fundamental to understanding the future of educational practices. A visit to schools in the Chicago area further illuminated the diverse interpretations and implementations of these models, sparking a vital discussion. Is it time to reconsider our vocabulary? Perhaps “flexible” learning is a more apt descriptor for the education model combining offsite online learning with onsite, teacher-led instruction. Blended Learning: Traditional School Day To dissect the distinction, let’s first clarify what we mean by “blended learning.” This approach integrates online educational materials and opportunities for interaction online with traditional place-based classroom methods. It requires the physical presence of both teacher and student in the school building every day of the week. Blended learning is a systematic integration of digital and physical learning environments to enhance educational outcomes in the traditional school day and building. Blended learning is a pedagogy that traditional schools use to infuse digital learning within the traditional school system. The funding and accountability perspective maintains the same since blended pedagogy is adopted within the traditional school day (e.g. seat time) and setting. Hybrid Learning: Mixed Onsite and Offsite Learning Hybrid learning, as it’s commonly misunderstood, is often used interchangeably with blended learning. However, the nuances that distinguish it are significant. True hybrid learning models offer a more flexible approach that combines online and in-person education. Hybrid distinguishes itself by allowing students to alternate between attending classes on-site and working online remotely, such that students can earn credits and the school maintains funding while students “work from home.” Hybrid learning provides a structure that can adapt to various schedules of onsite attendance, plus one or more days of “working from home.” Some states allow hybrid learning with relatively limited impacts on funding and accountability; other states prohibit hybrid learning either explicitly or by reducing funding. In other states, this mixed onsite and offsite learning (reducing physical seat time), may require legislative variances and result in reduced funding. The confusion is even more murky when a school adopts some hybrid classes into their schedule, versus adopting a hybrid program school-wide. Hybrid schools “intentionally” utilize online content for remote learning time allowing teachers to complement digital learning with higher-order projects, hands-on learning experiences, and quality peer-to-peer interactions in the traditional classroom.

Source: Digital Learning Collaborative: 2022 Snapshot As pointed out in the Reflections from DLAC (March 21, 2024) some independent study programs may fit our definition of hybrid schools—but few would call themselves hybrid schools. They deliver online, onsite, and hybrid courses, including dual credit, but the varied modalities aren’t front of mind for them. The Case for “Flexible” Learning During a site visit to the Chicago area, schools offered three types of classes: traditional, blended, and online. I was confused, in today’s technological world all traditional classrooms should be blended – right? It became evident that the Chicago area classes labeled as “blended” were, in fact, embracing hybrid learning principles. The “blended” classes, much like a college campus, met in person only two days a week, relying on online instruction to complement the physical classroom time. This observation begs the question: Are we mislabeling our K-12 educational models, thereby clouding understanding and implementation? Referring to a mixed model of traditional class days plus remote online learning days as “flexible” learning might offer a clearer, more accurate description. It highlights the adaptability of the varied schedule of learner needs and the seamless integration of online and onsite learning. This term can encompass the essence of what these innovative schools are achieving: an educational approach that fluidly combines the strengths of both traditional and digital realms to cater to the diverse needs of today’s students. Moving Forward: Clarity and Flexibility As educators, policymakers, and stakeholders continue to navigate the complexities of modernizing education, our terminology must evolve to accurately reflect the innovations at hand. The distinction between blended and hybrid—or, perhaps more aptly, flexible or mixed schedule—learning is not merely semantic. It represents a deeper understanding of how we can best serve the diverse learning needs of all students. Adopting clear, descriptive language will enable educators to share strategies, challenges, and successes more effectively, fostering a collaborative environment that benefits from shared knowledge. As we move forward, let us embrace the flexibility not only in our educational models but in the language we use to describe them. In doing so, we can ensure that every student has access to a learning path that meets them where they are, helping them to reach their full potential. So… what’s in a name? Quite a lot, as it turns out. The terms we choose to describe our educational models shape our perceptions and our realities. As we continue to innovate in the field of K-12 education, let’s select our words with care, ensuring they reflect the adaptability and inclusiveness at the heart of our teaching philosophies.

View email in browser Evergreen Education Group · 700 Main Ave Ste E · Durango, CO 81301-5437 · USA

Introducing Digital Learningpalooza 2024!🎸

An item from the folks at the Digital Learning Collaborative.

Hello, Coachella, Woodstock, SXSW… and introducing the new kid on the block DIGITAL LEARNINGPALOOZA! Unlike these other venues, this show is entirely online and dedicated to helping you become the next digital learning rockstar! As we collectively work to move the field forward by refreshing the National Standards for Quality Online Learning, we continue to find ways to provide you with meaningful and relevant ways to improve your programs and practice. As a member of the NSQ community, you know that finding NSQ aligned resources and professional learning will help your entire community to excel. You also know that NSQ Teaching Standard A3 makes a point of stating the importance of “continuously [pursuing] knowledge and skills related to online learning and pedagogy.” When the Digital Learningpalooza gates open the week of October 14th 2024, you’ll find stages with set lists that delve into bringing the standards to life. A mix-tape of learning specific to your needs Crowdsurf into MOSHPIT LEARNING and AI UNPLUGGED where you’ll find sessions aligned to NSQ Teaching Standard B: Digital Pedagogy. Leave with resources to help you meet indicator B1, and focused ways to incorporate them into your discipline, so that you can successfully meet B2. Actually, you can rock the mic to just about any of the NSQ Teaching Standards. We’re playing all of the hits and making sure that they get the air time needed so you can rock them out in your own learning environment. Administrator? We’ve got you covered, too! The NSQ Program Standards Program Standards will serve as our metronome and keep us moving in time to the beat at our CONDUCTOR SYMPOSIUM. You’ll participate in drum circles designed for engaging discussions around resources, equity and access, integrity and accountability, curriculum and course design, instruction, assessment, and support (Standards F through M)! Let us know what you want to learn… while we put together the program. Reach out to allison@evergreenedgroup.com to call in your requests. Build your band and expand your community. Tickets are on sale now! Be sure to register by May 31st to snag the best seats and Early Bird pricing. Already rocking the Standards? Consider presenting at DLAC 25 in Atlanta, GA! Submit your sessions showcasing how you align your work, and/or develop professional learning around the National Standards for Quality Online Learning. You’ll be able to submit them for consideration in our program beginning June 4! View email in browser National Standards for Quality Online Learning · 6024 Deer Trace Ct · Dunlap, IL 61525-9662 · USA

Ignite your practice: SPARK! Leader Edition

An item from the folks at the Digital Learning Collaborative.

The DLC is excited to continue our professional learning resource — SPARK! Leader and Teacher editions. These bi-weekly posts are designed to address a problem of practice and to ”ignite” digital learning through shared experiences and ideas that support our digital leader and teacher members and users. SPARK! is archived in our members-only document library, and written by the DLC team, members, and other contributing DLC community members. Contact CAO Allison Powell with your ideas and to contribute. Click here to join the DLC and access more members-only resources. How do you take your teachers beyond emergency remote learning and prepare them for the online teaching of today? By: Holly Boleski and Christy Trombetta, Michigan Virtual Finding high-quality and effective professional development that is specific to online teaching can be a challenge. Most online teaching PD today focuses on translating the work of a face-to-face teacher into an online setting. But today’s online teaching is so much more than post-pandemic online teaching. Teachers in online classrooms need specific training that is tailored to their way of teaching. I once heard it described that if face-to-face teaching is like driving a Ford, then online teaching is like driving a Chevy – both drive the same, both pedagogies the same. The reality is that if face-to-face teaching is like driving a Ford, then online teaching is like flying an F15 – both will get you to your end goal, but one modality requires some finesse in training and a different kind of expertise. But once you get it, boy does your teaching fly! Teachers in online classrooms require training that goes beyond basic technology use; they need strategies for engaging students virtually, designing effective assessments, fostering collaboration, and managing diverse learning needs in digital environments. Professional development programs that address these specific aspects of online teaching can empower educators to excel in their roles and enhance student learning outcomes. Just as flying an F15 requires specialized training and finesse, mastering online teaching requires educators to adapt and develop new skills, ultimately leading to more impactful and successful teaching experiences in online classrooms. Trade Secrets Make professional development for your online/hybrid/blended learning teachers a priority Professional development for online teachers needs to be thoughtful and applicable to their practice. Teachers already know the pedagogy of face-to-face classrooms and don’t want to waste their time with PD that doesn’t fit their teaching environment. PD should build upon existing pedagogical knowledge while providing them with the skills, resources, and support needed to excel in the digital learning environment. Develop a professional learning community with your online/hybrid/blended learning teachers A PLC for online teachers at a school can be a game-changer for your program! When teachers share expertise and collaborate, they’ll continuously learn, improve, and better serve their students. In a local PLC, teachers can share best practices specific to their classrooms and community and solve problems together as a team. The supportive environment of a PLC fosters collaboration, improves teacher morale, and enhances instructional strategies, ultimately leading to improved student outcomes through data-informed decision-making and personalized learning experiences. Recognize talent in the Online Teaching and Learning (OTL) space Need to hire a new online/blended/hybrid teacher but don’t know how to vet candidates from their resumes alone? Look for those who have credentials in the online teaching and learning space and who can showcase their skills! Assets https://michiganvirtual.org/professionals/remote-teaching/ https:/michiganvirtual.badgr.com/public/pathway/6458fd044179d06793ec0e4e www.nsqol.org/nsq-online-resources/ https:/nsq.2gno.me/ Holly Boleski and Christy Trombetta Holly Boleski and Christy Trombetta are former online teachers who now work to support online teachers and programs around the state of Michigan. Combined they have nearly 30 years of experience in the online teaching field. What they love most about their work is getting teachers to love teaching online and growing advocates for this awesome way of teaching and learning! Download PDF View email in browser Evergreen Education Group · 700 Main Ave Ste E · Durango, CO 81301-5437 · USA

Ignite your practice: SPARK! Leader Edition

An item from the folks at the Digital Learning Collaborative.

The DLC is excited to continue our professional learning resource — SPARK! Leader and Teacher editions. These bi-weekly posts are designed to address a problem of practice and to ”ignite” digital learning through shared experiences and ideas that support our digital leader and teacher members and users. SPARK! is archived in our members-only document library, and written by the DLC team, members, and other contributing DLC community members. Contact CAO Allison Powell with your ideas and to contribute. Click here to join the DLC and access more members-only resources. What is the best way to make connections with our online students? By: Jaime Lopez, Principal for Florence Virtual Academy (AZ) Florence Virtual Academy has set up special meetings called Goal Planning Meetings for each student. These happen once a week and give students the opportunity to talk with their Academic Advisor. During these meetings, they chat about how they’re doing in school, how much progress they’re making, and if they’ve been attending classes regularly. Students also take time to think about their week and write down what went well and what they want to work on for the next week. They make a SMART goal (Specific, Measureable, Achievable, Relevant, and has a Time limit). After the meeting, the advisor documents what they talked about and shares it with the student and their parents. This helps everyone stay on the same page and support the student together. When students finish their meetings with their Academic Advisor at Florence Virtual Academy, their advisor inputs everything they talked about in our Goal Planning document. This document keeps track of how the student is doing, what they’re struggling with, and what they’re aiming for. The document is shared among the student’s academic support team (Advisor, parents, and student). This way, everyone stays connected and knows what’s happening and can help the student do their best in school. These meetings are important because they bring everyone together to talk about the student’s progress and make plans for implementing supports and how to improve on a regular basis. Florence Virtual Academy’s Goal Planning Meetings are really helpful for students as they get to spend time thinking about both how they’re doing and what they want to do better. Talking with their Academic Advisor helps them make realistic goals and plans to reach them. These meetings aren’t just about grades—they’re about making sure students have the tools and encouragement they need to succeed in school and beyond. Trade Secrets Try, tweak and try again.   Implementation or changes should happen at any natural break, for example Winter Break.   Give the process time, use the parts that work for your school and modify and improve the parts that are not successful. Assets Google Drive Folder of Resources Coaching Conversations- Transforming Your School One Conversation at a Time (Gross, L. M., & Reilly, M. F. (2010). Coaching Conversations. Corwin Press.) Jaime Lopez Jaime Lopez has been the Principal for Florence Virtual Academy for the past seven years. She holds a dual Masters in Educational Leadership and Curriculum/Instruction. Jaime is the district’s Imagine Learning Coordinator and supports all schools with the use of their online curriculum and staff training. Download PDF View email in browser Evergreen Education Group · 700 Main Ave Ste E · Durango, CO 81301-5437 · USA

Bias in the Machine: The Lack of Equity and Inclusion in AI tools

An item from the folks at the Digital Learning Collaborative.

By Jon Fila In November and December of 2022 when I started receiving some odd student submissions in my English 12 course I needed to figure out what was going on. At first I was annoyed, then intrigued, then annoyed again, maybe even a little angry. I made a lot of mistakes in those first two months with how I addressed students using ChatGPT. I dove in and did what I could to figure out what was happening, how the tools worked and how to address learners who were using them inappropriately. Within two more months I was facilitating table talks and sharing some of what I was learning at DLAC in 2023. That led to me writing some guides on how we might think about using them in education. Even after a year, I think they still hold up, but something is still bothering me. Part of my job involves writing curriculum. It once took me a full calendar year to write one of the courses I teach now. How much time could I save if I used generative AI as an assistant? It became a big part of my day and continues to seep into many aspects of my life. I’ve now presented on some aspect of this technology over 50 times throughout the country and online and for as much as things evolve, some things have not changed. These tools are inherently biased, and I have enormous concerns about the level of adoption educators are navigating. Don’t get me wrong. I’m a proponent of embracing these Large Language Models (LLM) in our work. I use them every day. I’m also a skeptic. It is in our best interests to figure out everything we can about these tools; the implications they may have on learning and the learners themselves. My guiding philosophy is that the default version of anything sucks and it is only when we customize something to suit our individual needs, or the needs of our learners, or organizations that we find its usefulness. So what are these default versions of LLM giving us? Before I answer that, please consider for a moment the last time you experienced a new technology, that by default, supported and lifted up marginalized communities. Maybe you thought of one, I can’t. There is implicit bias baked into just about everything humans make. It’s not always even intentional, but it is unavoidable. Think about these LLM. Who selected the programmers, what biases do they come with? Choices made when coding often further perpetuate existing systemic inequities. Also think about how these models were trained. We uploaded a massive amount of information humans have written on all manner of topics. Biased humans, many with a propensity for racism, misogyny, homophobia, ableism, and more. We can put all the guardrails we want on these tools but at the end of the day, so much of what we’ve written as a species is littered with content that does not align with our current values. We also know that these LLM have an inclination toward sycophancy. They tell us what we want to hear. Some of that is by design and some of it gets worse as the systems are updated. The LLM will also “make assumptions” about the person doing the prompting. This aids the tools in determining just how thorough the response should be. Above all else, humans want to see responses that align with their existing beliefs. So why do I still encourage people to use generative AI when all of these things are true? It’s because I believe that we can prompt the LLM away from those tendencies by creating a clearer picture of what we are looking for and are not looking for. When I prompt these tools, I ask them to incorporate elements of Social Emotional Learning (SEL) and Universal Design for Learning (UDL) in resources for students; I ask for anti-racist examples with multiple perspectives included; I ask for the use of inclusive language that demonstrates care and support, and too many other prompts to get into with this writing. I also ask these tools to avoid suggesting what I don’t want. I don’t want antiquated and debunked practices around learning styles or left/right brain thinking, and so many other educational myths that persist. It also matters what we tell the tools about ourselves. If I tell them I am an educator, my responses will be more detailed and there are more ways to prompt for more comprehensive and inclusive results. I quite literally include aspects of SEL in my prompts to teach the LLM within the context of each chat, the kind of language I expect in return. I want to see these five fundamentals incorporated into assignment directions and reflections: self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship skills, and responsible decision-making. I do the same thing with UDL principles. If I do not see those things, I push back and have it try again. When I was writing a 7th grade activity for students writing nature journals, I asked ChatGPT for a list of poets who write about nature. It gave me a nice long list, that included Ralph Waldo Emerson, and guess what? A bunch of other white men. That’s not good enough for me, or for my learners. In Minnesota we have a large Somali population, Latino population, Hmong population, we have 11 reservations representing Dakota and Anishinaabe peoples, I cannot put a lesson like this in front of learners who come to us across the state that do not include people from those groups, so I asked. It gave lists of more writers to me for each of those groups and I kept going, but there was one more group of people missing, women! How many educators having AI tools writing lesson plans for them right now are continuing to push back until they see the faces of their students reflected in the lessons? I don’t know, but if there are some who are not, then this technology is setting us back. We know that not everyone is asking within their prompts to use inclusive language, give multiple perspectives, anti-racist examples (yes, add those things directly to your prompts!) You will also get better responses if you tell the LLM more about your setting, your student population, and yourself. Lie if you need to. Tell it you are a national teacher of the year, known for your engaging lessons and demonstration of care for your students, etc. etc. Make yourself sound as important as you can and you will get better responses. Here’s an example I created just using something simple like making a BLT. Tell it about your setting, are you hybrid, asynchronous, those details help. Tell it that you are working with struggling students who are having difficulty understanding a specific benchmark and you will get more context and strategies. But be careful there too! It will often suggest things that have been debunked like learning styles. None of this should surprise us, but it’s something we might not have thought of when we just jump in, click around and make some requests to make our workload a bit lighter. If we trained these tools on a bunch of our own biases, then of course that’s what these tools “think” we sound like and it will parrot those same biases back to us by default…unless we tell them not to. It’s up to us. Do I care which of the hundreds of AI applications you choose or use? Not really, though some are better than others. What I care most about is that you do not turn your thinking over to a machine; and that we are responsible for the material we put in front of learners through a thorough vetting process by subject matter experts with training and background in equity and inclusion initiatives. I care that we are not giving a platform and agency to machines before we even make sure marginalized groups of humans have representation. There are so many other tasks we are giving AI tools to do for us that need thoughtful consideration (observations, data analysis, accommodations/modifications, etc.) Default responses from AI are not what we need, we need thoughtful, caring professionals that are going to use these tools collaboratively and responsibly. That can only be accomplished through much discussion and consideration about the problem that we are trying to solve when we look to these tools. The marketers of these tools aren’t putting those practices at the forefront of what they are doing, that responsibility falls on you. These tools have the potential to change lives; only you will determine if that’s for better or worse. Jon Fila is an award winning educator and currently teaches English at Northern Star Online. He has written several books on the use of AI in education for students and educators. He provides workshops, and other trainings on how we should be thinking about incorporating these tools into our practices. You can find out more at jonfila.com, or learn more about his online modules to address these kinds of issues at inclusiveaistrategies.com. View email in browser Evergreen Education Group · 700 Main Ave Ste E · Durango, CO 81301-5437 · USA