1. Introduction to Blended Learning
Bill Wisser, Ph.D.
Simmons College
24 April 2012
Thanks Naresh for the introduction. And welcome everyone to this ASIST webinar on blended learning. As one minor point of clarification, the title of the session is introduction to blended and hybrid learning. I consider those words signifying the same approach, so I will consistently use blended throughout this webinar to avoid any confusion. As an aside, there are technology support people on the line to help with any technical issues you may encounter with the webinar software. Please use the chat feature to post any issues. I will also keep one eye on the chat box for content-based questions. I will try to address any that ask for clarification, but I will leave the more substantial questions till the end of the session. There is 15 minutes at the end reserved for questions.
I’m very happy to be able to talk to you about blended learning because I am a big proponent of the modality. Blended learning has been around for a while now, but until recently it was considered an emerging trend. It is no longer emerging; it is already here. It is hard to pinpoint numbers of growth, but as I talk there is a conference on blended learning hosted by the Sloan Consortium being held in Wisconsin. One of the speakers yesterday noted that 80% of college students today have taken or will take a blended course before they graduate. Personally, I think that is a bit high and reflects the difficulty in defining exactly what blended means. The speaker went on to say that it is projected that in the next few years online education will plateau while blended will continue to rise. I do agree with that statement. As more institutions come to realize that online education is not the instant moneymaker they hope, there will be a refocus on enhancing the educational experience and increasing flexibility of learning regardless of where the students actually are.
Growth is not the only reason to be interested in blended learning. A recent study from the US department of education compared face to face, blended and online delivery methods against a range of learning outcomes. This study indicated that bended learning is more effective than either face to face or online in meeting identified learning outcomes. There is plenty of debate going on right now about that survey and its results, but it does indicated that there are plenty of reasons to be interested in learning more about this exciting enhancement to the academy.

2. What is Blended Learning?
What does a Blended course look like?
What are the advantages and challenges of Blended Learning?
Now you are most likely in this webinar because you’ve heard of blended learning, but you may not know exactly what it is or what it looks like. Therefore, I built the agenda to touch on those critical issues. In 45 minutes we can only stay at a top-level discussion of what blended learning is, and as you will note later in the conversation, there are many, many decisions that need to be made about your blended course and the process you will use to blend your course. Therefore, there are no specific guidelines or a one-size-fits all approach that I can impart to you. That being said, I can provide an overview to the format of blended learning and impart some suggestions for both structure and development. I also will pass on a set of resources that I hope you will find useful.

3. First, some introductory comments
First, some introductory comments. As Naresh noted, I am the associate director for faculty development at Simmons College in Boston. I am a historian by trade, but I have been working as an instructional designer supporting faculty as they incorporate technology into their classrooms for a few years now. A few years ago, Simmons won a grant from the Sloan foundation to explore blended learning at a small residential campus. As a result, we created a series of resources including a robust website with training materials and examples that I will share with you at the end of the session. 25 % of full-time faculty at Simmons College (including Naresh) have gone through an intensive week-long Blended Learning Institute conducted by my department, and many of them have developed blended courses. We’ll see some of their reactions to the model a little later on.
If you’re not that familiar with Simmons, it is located in Boston, a little west of downtown, right next to the MFA and Fenway park. The college has an all-women’s undergraduate population and five co-ed graduate schools, of which the graduate school of library and information science is one. The mix of undergraduate liberal arts education with graduate professional education provides an environment that is conducive to exploring innovative learning environments. A major push of the College recently is to attract non-traditional age students to Simmons by increasing the flexibility of courses and programs. Blended learning is a natural fit for that purpose.
In case you’re wondering, that’s me in the bottom left and my office on the right where I am hanging out right now.

4. What is Blended Learning?
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Blended
The first big question on the agenda is what is blended learning. This is not as simple as you may think. There are no hard and fast rules for what makes a course blended. The Sloan consortium defines blended learning as a course where 30%-70% of the instruction is delivered online, but that range provides little insight into a definition of a blended course. At Simmons we do not set any percentages to determine whether a class is blended – the only critical designator is that the course has an integrated online component and a concomitant decrease in face-to-face seat time.
Does your institution have any standards that you know of for what makes a course blended? Please jot down an answer in the chat window if you know them.

5. What is Blended Learning?
“…a portion of the traditional face-to-face instruction is replaced by web-based online learning.” UCF Blend toolkit
“…the thoughtful fusion of face-to-face and online learning experiences.” Garrison and Vaughn, Blended Learning in Higher Education
“…a significant amount of the learning activities have been moved online, and time traditionally spent in the classroom is reduced but not eliminated” Garnham & Kaleta, Introduction to Hybrid Courses
The literature provides us with a few conceptual definitions of a blended course, though as you will note they are not specific or descriptive enough for you to build a blended course based solely on their definitions. Note that the first and third both indicate a replacement of face to face time with online learning activities. That is an important component of any definition of blended learning.

6. What is Blended Learning?
“…a portion of the traditional face-to-face instruction is replaced by web-based online learning.” UCF Blend toolkit
“…the thoughtful fusion of face-to-face and online learning experiences.” Garrison and Vaughn, Blended Learning in Higher Education
“…a significant amount of the learning activities have been moved online, and time traditionally spent in the classroom is reduced but not eliminated” Garnham and Kaleta, Introduction to Hybrid Courses
The most important of these ideas though is the concept of thoughtful fusion. A blended course is not a web-enhanced face-to-face course where online work exists in parallel to or in addition to face to face work. They are thoughtfully integrated to create something different than face to face or online.

7. What is Blended Learning not?
You may have heard recently of the concept of the flipped classroom. The flipped classroom is where students individually complete the passive work of knowledge acquisition on their own time outside of class through recorded lectures or guided reading. The in-class time is then spent on discussion and interaction instead of lecture. Faculty in the humanities have been teaching this way for as long as I’ve been around higher ed, but it is now gaining popularity in the sciences where some of the last holdouts of the lecture-based classroom reside. There is nothing wrong with the flipped classroom if it is designed well (short engaging videos, for example), but it is not a blended course. The face to face and online work is not integrated. Rather, the online work is more of a supplement to the face to face classroom. It is individual homework rather than meaningful construction of knowledge. As I mentioned above, there is nothing wrong with this approach, but it is not what I would call blended.

8. What is Blended Learning?
…combines the best of face-to-face learning and the best of online learning to create something different.
If there is one definition of blended learning that I come back to most often it is this idea. The key ideas here are that blended takes what works really well in a face to face setting and couples it with what works really well in an online setting to create something different. What I mean by the best of the two modalities may differ from class to class,

9. Face to Face Online Community building Trust building
Spontaneous reaction
Clarification
Reflection
Analysis
Exploration
Creation
But there are some commonly accepted generalities of the advantages of face to face and the advantages of online. One great advantage of blended as we will see below is that you are not restricted by the modality. You can choose the format that best meets your learning goals. One disadvantage of blended is that you are not restricted by the modality. You need to very carefully consider your learning outcomes to be able to choose the most advantageous modality.
The advantages listed above are not activities. They are the intended purpose behind activities. Obviously, though, when planning for your blended course you will need to consider what modality is best suited for your specific activities, which may be dependent on your intended outcomes. Take discussion for example

10. Discussion is the backbone of a blended course
. Discussion is the backbone of a blended course. Students use both in-person and online discussion as the classroom – that is where the learning is happening. It can be done in both modalities, but for different purposes and with different outcomes. In an online discussion forum students have the time and ability to carefully construct a reasoned post and response. They can research the topic, bring in outside sources, and edit their post. In an in-class discussion, student conversation will be more spontaneous, more reactive. The discussion may go in many different directions, and you are there at the moment to guide it or let it develop. Both discussion formats can be very meaningful and constructive, but they are different.
I’d be interested to hear your take now on what standard elements of your courses would best be suited in a face to face environment and which ones would be best accomplished in an online environment. Use the chat feature to throw out an idea. For instance – short low-stakes quizzes online – [if no response: what about research for a literature review? Practice encoding a finding aid?]

11. What does a Blended course look like?
Integrated
Purposeful
Learner focused
Structure
This will be the shortest of my sections for one main reason; the answer to this question is “it depends.” What a blended course looks like depends on a whole host of factors that include your course material, your goals for the course, the type of interaction you want to foster, your comfort with technology, etc. There is no one-size that fits all; rather, we must ensure that the components are integrated, there is a clear purpose and rationale for the type of blend you are employing, and that it is learner focused. That is, the point is to enhance learning outcomes for your students.

12. Structure
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Now, there are different structures that I’ve worked with faculty on. One social work faculty has one online session after every two face to face sessions. In that online session the students are working together to apply concepts discussed in the face to face sessions. They then bring back the results of their collective work to the next face to face session and compare notes.

13. Structure OL OL F2F OL F2F OL OL
A nursing faculty member only has two face to face sessions at the beginning and end of the semester. She has designed the course in this way partly because her audience is made up of high-level healthcare executives who come from regional locations not adjacent to Boston. She uses the face to face sessions to enhance the online classroom by establishing community, setting up the framework for the course, then re-connecting to reflect. OL

14. Structure OL
F2F
F2F OL
Finally, I regularly teach series of blended learning workshops that are in and of themselves blended. I usually conduct one face to face session and then have the equivalent of two sessions online before the next face to face session. In the face to face sessions I introduce a theoretical concept and discuss the work the participants will be doing online. In the first online session they are working independently to create course maps and integrated activities, and the next online session they are sharing their work and providing feedback to their peers. When we come back together face to face they reflect on the process as a whole group and then we build on those learned concepts with new material.
Again, the structure depends on your goals for the course.

15. Advantages
So now I’d like to talk about a few advantages of blended learning. These advantages are drawn from conversations with faculty and a survey that I conducted last year among Simmons faculty who have gone through training and have developed and taught a blended course.

16. Simmons Faculty Satisfaction Survey
When asked what they liked most about blended learning, there was a range of replies with no outright winner. Flexibility is obviously key. The blended environment greatly enhances the flexibility of the face to face classroom. Many programs are being developed as blended particularly to reach student populations that cannot attend a fully face-to-face program – think executive level education. This is also a consideration in the LIS field as you look to attract working practitioners into your programs.

17. Advantages of blended learning
…best of both worlds …increased communication …enhanced participation …more peer interaction …flexibility for students
When asked to qualitatively describe the advantages, some of the same concepts appeared. Note that the three ideas in the middle

18. Advantages of blended learning
…best of both worlds …increased communication …enhanced participation …more peer interaction …flexibility for students
Are similar. The idea of increased communication and participation is a common refrain heard from experienced blended faculty. In a face to face classroom of 20 or so students how many students do you hear from in a substantial way each class period? 10? 5? Less? In a blended course participation is close to 100%. The success of the course relies on the active participation of each student, and you must build in meaningful opportunities for student interaction.

19. Advantages of Blended No restrictions Promotes active learning
Higher student engagement
Flexibility
To sum up the advantages of blended learning, there are no restrictions to the learning environment that you create. That is, you can take the elements of face to face and online to meet your learning objectives. Faculty have noted that blended classes have higher engagement among the students. And finally, the component of flexibility for both faculty and students comes through all faculty reactions to the blended model.
The learning pyramid here is a take on Bloom’s taxonomy of learning that assesses how we retain information. Bloom’s taxonomy is expressed in a range of lower order skills (remembering, listing) to higher order skills (analyzing, creating). I like this pyramid’s representation in that it puts the onus on the faculty member who is actually creating the learning experience. If we as designers of learning stay at the level of lecture or reading, then our students are simply not retaining what we expect them to. The increased flexibility and expectations of engagement that we place on students in a blended environment can lead toward the higher retention levels of this pyramid.

20. Challenges
Ok, that all sounds great, but what about the challenges. What are the most difficult aspects of designing and delivering a blended course?

21. Simmons Faculty Satisfaction Survey
The majority of faculty surveyed indicated that the time to develop was the biggest disadvantage of a blended course. This was expected and is a quite natural reaction. Designing a blended course requires you to re-conceptualize the course from the ground up to take advantage of the positives of the modality and to avoid some of the common traps that I will discuss in a moment. As a general rule of thumb, at Simmons College we recommend that if a faculty member wants to teach a blended course in the Fall semester, he or she begins the planning and development process in January of the preceding semester. So, it takes the length of a course to prepare a blended course.

22. Challenges to Blended Learning
…time …students aren’t ready for it …time and task management …change in method of teaching …time it takes to clarify concepts …difficult to assess
Qualitatively, as you would expect, time was a major factor for faculty but

23. Challenges to Blended Learning
…time …students aren’t ready for it …time and task management …change in method of teaching …time it takes to clarify concepts …difficult to assess
I want to highlight the concept in the middle regarding change in method of teaching. In a blended class, the instructor relinquishes the role of teacher and adopts the role of facilitator.
Higher education pedagogy is constructed around the concept of the brick and mortar classroom. That construct favors a didactic approach – where students passively listen to an instructor relate information. Even if we try to break down that construct by developing interactive experiences, sitting in a circle, have students present to each other, the classroom model insists that the instructor is always present, visible, and in control. That does not operate well in an online environment. Online, students are more responsible for their own learning, as instructors guide them in that exploratory process. Students are expected to participate as part of a community of learners as they construct their own understanding of a topic. The instructor establishes the learning environment and guides student interaction, but he or she is not directing student learning. This is a very different method of teaching than we experienced as students (most likely), and it takes some getting used to.

24. Challenges to Blended Learning
New paradigm for design and teaching
Requires redesign
Time!
To wrap up the challenges to blended learning, they include a new style of teaching that may be uncomfortable for some faculty, the fact that courses need to be redesigned to leverage the two modalities, and the time commitment to develop and deliver a truly integrated blended course.
Time to develop is not the only disadvantage to a blended course. Remember I noted above that participation in a blended course is close to 100%. That’s a lot of discussion to manage. How do you read posts and responses that can get quite lengthy from every student in your class several times a week while managing their expectations that you are online 24/7? Short answer: you can’t. Instead, you set expectations for your presence early in the semester, provide guidelines for participation that indicate length of responses, and develop opportunities for peer critique and grading. Unlike in a face to face class, every element of a blended course needs to be intentional and explicit – from your expectations to their expectations to policies and guidelines, etc.

25. Common Traps Building a course and a half
Now I’d like to discuss a few of the common traps that faculty who are new to blended learning may fall into. Discussing how to avoid these traps can also help planning from the outset. The first trap is the course and a half. Face to face classes are bound by time and space. For example, you may have 90 minutes in a classroom with computer, internet and one whiteboard. The chairs have wheels. That layout will dictate much of what you will do in the classroom and higher ed pedagogy is built with the brick and mortar classroom in mind. In a blended course, the framework is whatever you want it to be. When designing a blended course it is very tempting to take your existing face to face course and add online components. When you do that you are building more than your original course, hence the course and a half.

26. Common Traps
Another common trap is to lead with the tools. There are dozens of educational technology tools that are available to help meet your course goals and it is very tempting to use too many tools or use them just for the sake of using them. Not every blended course needs a hangout, hashmark, and backchannel. When I work with faculty members who are new to blended learning, I often have to counsel them that they do not need to worry about all the tools that are available. Starting slow by incorporating one or two new teaching tools is often more than enough.

27. Common Traps The activity trap
The activity trap refers to the idea of designing the course around what you will have students do, rather than what you want them to understand or know by the end of the course. There is a temptation when blending a course to fill it with online activities that may not advance the learning goals for the course. Without a clear direction, the activities can become the focus, and students may feel that they are being asked to do “busy work” throughout the course.

28. A suggested process
The suggested process to avoid the common traps outlined above and make the whole process manageable is something called Backwards Design. Backwards Design asks you to consider the desired outcomes of the course before identifying the deliverables and the learning sequences.

29. Backwards Design Outcomes
Essentially, you start at the end and work backwards from there. What backwards design requires is a consideration of where you want students to be at the end of the course. What do you want them to know and be able to do by the time the course is over.

30. Backwards Design Evidence Outcomes
Once the outcomes are identified, then you can consider the evidence that you will accept that shows that students have met those outcomes.

31. Backwards Design Learning Sequence Evidence Outcomes
Finally, you then consider the learning sequences, which include the activities, readings, etc., that will provide the students with the information and the skills that will enable them to produce the evidence that will show they have met the outcomes. It is only at the learning sequence step where you consider what goes online and what goes face to face, and what technology tools you will use to accomplish your goals. If you use the backwards design model when redesigning your blended course you will be more able to avoid the common traps indicated above.

32. General suggestions Lead with the outcomes Start simple Get help
Assess, reflect, and revise
Now I’d like to offer some general suggestions. If you are considering developing a blended course, start with the outcomes. Take the time to consider what you want your students to learn by the end of the course. That will help you conceptualize how the course will operate in a blended environment. Second, start simple. The entire course does not need to be blended when you first start. Maybe one module of the course will be blended, or maybe two or three sessions will be conducted online and then brought back into the classroom. Just remember that any online time requires a concomitant reduction in face to face time. Then, get help. Perhaps your school has instructional design support of instructional technology support. Your institution may have training or workshops that you can attend. If you’re on your own, than look to the professional organizations like the Sloan consortium, or Educause that host conferences, publish related material, and provide certification for faculty interested in teaching blended or online. There are also two web-based resources that I will discuss in a moment that I think you will find useful. One criticism of that Department of Education report I mentioned at the beginning of the webinar is that it is unlikely that faculty members design a blended course without assistance from a pedagogy and technology professional, whereas we all know that many faculty teach face to face and online without any support. Since blended is relatively new and may seem foreign to both faculty and administrators, there is more structured support available. So, is it the modality that is more effective in meeting learning outcomes, or is it the training and support that makes it so? Finally, once you have developed and delivered your blended course, assess, reflect, and revise. What went well? What needs to be improved? How can the blend be better integrated? Before we move on to resources and general questions, I’d like you to think about the question asked in the poll that began this session. What is one word that you would use to describe your feelings regarding blended learning right now. Use the chat feature to jot down your word. It can be the same as it was in the beginning or different.

33. Resources Sample Course Materials Video Interviews Course Tours
Recommended Exercises
Video Interviews
Course Tours
Tool showcase
I mentioned back at the beginning of the webinar that we created a robust website to chronicle our blended learning initiative. On that website are a number of resources that you may find useful to help you envision your blended course. I’d like to point out two elements of particular interest. First, there is a series of case studies that showcase the work of individual faculty members, including course walkthroughs, exercises and handouts they created, and an interview with the faculty member.

34. Resources
The second set of resources at formative and summative evaluations. We use the formative evaluations on the left as an initial guide when working with faculty members. It serves as a checklist of both required and suggested elements of a blended course. The summative evaluation on the right is used by an instructional designer after the completion of a course to provide feedback and suggestions for revisions. You’ll find both on the website and you are welcome to use them yourself.

35. Resources http://at.simmons.edu/blendedlearning
And the website address is provided here. The second website is from the University of Central Florida. UCF by far has the largest number of blended courses and programs. As a result, their website has a significant number of resources you may benefit from, including a blended toolkit that is intended to guide faculty through the process of designing a blended course.
Finally, the last resources is my address. If you have any questions that are not answered in the time we have left, I’d be happy to respond to your query. Thanks for your time and I will now open it to questions. You can raise your virtual hand to indicate you’re like to speak or you can use the chat window to post any questions you have.