What is Blended Learning at NIC?
- Teaching and learning activities occur in the on-campus classroom and in digital formats using a variety of learning technologies and digital resources.
- The course has scheduled and required in-class instruction and contact time between instructor and students.
- The course also has regular digital interactions between the course instructor and students.
- The amount of time for the digital activity vs. the in-class activity is set by the instructor and varies by course.
- Students should refer to the course meeting schedule or outline for more details.
- Blended courses often have content delivered in digital formats leaving the in-class time for application activities, experiential and hands-on learning along with specific assessments.
- There are defined expectations and deadlines for completion of assignments and other course related activities both for the on-campus classes and digital interactions.
- Students may have to work in groups with other students or do collaborative activities.
- Group activities may be done during in-class and/or via digital format interactions.
- Mid-terms, tests, and quizzes including any final exams will take place digitally via a variety of formats.
- If a final exam is scheduled for the course, the exam will take place digitally on a certain day/time according to the institutional exam schedule.
- There may be optional real-time office hours as part of the course.
Blended learning has many elements that need planning, organization and execution to appropriately engage students in successful blended learning experiences. Here are some tips:
- Use in-class learning experiences for hands-on, applied and practical experiences.
- Use in-class learning experiences for assessments and demonstrations of learning that need to be observed, done with materials or in environments that have specialized resources.
- Put all content engagement, reading, watching, passive learning experiences to the digital format.
- Have students engage in small assessments (e.g., a short quiz, post in discussion forum, video summary) prior to arriving for in-class learning. In this way you can see where you may need to re-teach or re-emphasize certain learning that may not have been successfully obtained.
Resources
- Best Practices for Designing Blended Courses | Webpage from Centre for Teaching Excellence, University of Waterloo
- Getting Started with Designing a Hybrid Learning Course | Webpage from Center for Teaching Innovation, Cornell University
- Blended and Online Learning | Website from Taylor Institute for Teaching and Learning | University of Calgary
- Blended Learning | a free e-book by Jackie Doherty