The 2013 Graduate Research and Arts Symposium. Las Cruces, NM.

The HyFlex Course Design: Exploring Students’ Meanings of the Learning

Experience

Mariam Abdelmalak Doctoral Candidate, Curriculum & Instruction department, College of Education

The HyFlex Course Design:

The Purpose of the Study:• The purpose of this study was to answer the

following questions: 1)What does the design of a course that follows a

HyFlex course design look like?

1)What are meanings students construct from the learning experience of HyFlex course design?

Theoretical Framework:

• A learner-centered framework

• Flexible learning & Flexible delivery

A Learner-centered Framework:• Considering student needs, interests, and goals

(McCombs, 2000; Ongeri, 2011; Dewey, 1938).

• Students’ control over their learning (Weimer, 2002; Cleveland-Innes & Emes, 2005; Yilmaz, 2009).

• Flexible learning: Interactive learning environments to anyone, anyplace, anytime by utilizing the attributes and resources of the Internet and digital technologies (Khan, 2007; Casey & Wilson, 2005; Singh, 2003).

• Flexible delivery: Focuses on options regarding: the what, where, and when learning occurs (Yusuf, 2009; Hill, 2006).

Flexible Learning & Flexible Delivery:

Method• Qualitative Case Study.• Data Gathering Methods: Observation: a graduate educational technology

course for 2:30 hours per week for one semester. Interview: the instructor & 6 graduate students. Cross-Case Analysis

The Design of an Educational technology Course That Followed the HyFlex Design:

Before HyFlex Design After HyFlex DesignFace-to-face

Meeting every week

Face-to-face + online + class recordings

Meeting twice a month

Sample Week:Face-to-face students

Online students Students who do not attend either face-to-face or online

Share verbally thought & ideas

Can use chat in adobe connect room

Face-to-face students collaborate together

Share verbally using microphone and share screen features in adobe connect roomUse chat

Online students collaborate together using adobe connect room

Listen to the class recording, and respond in the discussion area.

Discussion area

Students’ meanings:

The Instructor Flexibility to Accommodate to students’ needs & Circumstances:

• She is very accommodating to her students need. She recognizes that in order to meet students’ needs, accommodations need to be met in more ways than just learning accommodations. It is also a physical space, physical presence accommodation. I appreciate that very much. (Sara)

• She understands life happens. It is recognition to the fact that she is working with people who have life outside academia, people who have jobs and kids and family and what else can happen. That she recognizes we are adult that we are running things that will break our schedule from cannot make the face to face, so the recording and the online option are there in case something happens. (Sonia)

The Instructor Flexibility to Accommodate to students’ needs & Circumstances:

• She accommodates to my needs of time by allowing me to attend online, otherwise I will not be able to take this course. (Sara)

• The instructor openness to meet students’ needs helped me to engage and participate in the class. (Sammy)

Increased access:• Even if I did not attend the live section, I was still able

to listen to the recording and know what was talked about and got a sense of what I missed. So being able to listen to the recording does keep me on the track. I do not feel like: I am falling behind because I missed a week. (Sammy)

• With recoding the class history, I am able to attend. Even when I cannot attend, I am still attending. I can go back and review, I can go back and capture just a piece of that information, see the presentation again if I want to repeat it, if I did not understand something I can go back and check my understanding. (Sara)

Differentiated Instruction: • It makes more convenient for our learning styles

because we all have different learning styles. If you are more comfortable to be in a face-to-face environment, it is great. Or if you do not need face-to-face interactions, you can learn from home. Just choose what makes you learn better. (Karl)

• There is more than one way to learn. Learning expectations are the same, but this does mean it has to be all one-way. I think she tries to say: I have these expectation you have to get out of the course but we can approach it with different ways of doing it and give you some choices and give you some flexibility and still get the learning outcome. (Sammy)

Student control: • Traditional delivery is a matter of control from the school

and from the instructor, it forces you to conform to what they want and what they believe is the most efficient methodology of delivery. (Sonia)

• But in this class, we recognize that the most efficient method of delivery may be different for each person, that due to constrains external to academic life, we may not be able to attend class in person, but we will benefit from the online and if something comes up where we cannot even manage that, then we benefit from the recording. So it is a recognition that not everyone has to attend every class and take notes. We are taking control of our own learning situation, rather than someone else is in control of it. (Sonia)

Conclusion:• Adult learners need flexible learning so they can

balance study, work, family and other commitments.

• Educators of adult learners are actively encouraged to find effective and flexible delivery models to provide all students with more convenient access to quality learning experiences than is possible with traditional on campus offerings alone.

• This requires that instructors of adult learners value providing participation choices to students more than they value forcing everyone into the “best” way of learning a set of content (Beatty, 2010).

References:• Beatty, B. (2006, October). Designing the HyFlex world - Hybrid, flexible courses for all students. Paper presented

at the 2006 Association for Educational Communication and Technology International Conference, Dallas, TX.

• Beatty, B. (2007). Hybrid classes with flexible participation options – If you build it, how will they come? Paper presented at the 2007 Association for Educational Communications and Technology Annual Convention (October), Anaheim, CA. retrieved October 7, 2012, from http://itec.sfsu.edu/hyflex/beatty_hyflex_participation_aect_2007.pdf

• Beatty, B. (2008). Using the "HyFlex" course and design process. 2008 Sloan-C Effective Practice Award. Retrieved October 7, 2012, from http://sloanconsortium.org/effective_practices/using-quothyflexquot-course-and-design-process

• Beatty, B. (2010). Hybrid courses with flexible participation- The HyFlex design. Retrieved Sep. 24, 2012, from http://itec.sfsu.edu/hyflex/hyflex_course_design_theory_2.2.pdf

• Beatty, B. (2012). HyFlex course design: The advantages of letting students choose the blend. 9 th Annual Sloan Consortium Blended Learning Conference & Workshop. Retrieved October 7, 2012, from http://sloanconsortium.org/conference/2012/blended/hyflex-course-design-advantages-letting-students-choose-blend

• Casey, J., & Wilson, P. (2005). A practical guide to providing flexible learning in further and higher education.

Retrieved October 7, 2012, from http://www.enhancementthemes.ac.uk/docs/publications/a-practical-guide-to-providing-flexible-learning-in-further-and-higher-education.pdf

• De George-Walker, L., & Keeffe, M. (2010). Self-determined blended learning: A case study of blended learning design. Higher Education Research & Development, 29(1). Retrieved October 7, 2012, from http://eprints.usq.edu.au/8603/2/De_George-Walker_Keeffe_HERD_v29n1_AV.pdf

• Dowling, C., Godfrez, J., & Gyles, N. (2003, December). Do hybrid flexible delivery teaching methods improve accounting students’ learning outcomes? Accounting Education, 12 (4), 373–391.

References:• Hill, J. (2006). Flexible learning environments: Leveraging the affordances of flexible delivery and flexible

learning. Innovative High Education, 31, 187–197. • Khan, B. (2007). Flexible learning in an open and distributed environment. In B. Khan (Ed.) Flexible learning

in an information society (pp. 1-17). USA: Information science Publishing. • King, B. (1996). Life, learning and flexible delivery. Journal of Distance Learning, 2(1), 3-13.

• MacDonald, J. (2006). Blended learning and online tutoring: A good practice guide, Aldershot, UK: Gower Publishing Co.

• Singh, H. (2003). Building Effective Blended Learning Programs. Educational Technology, 43 (6), 51-54. • • Stake, R. (1998). Case Studies. In N. Denzin & Y. Lincoln (Eds). Strategies of qualitative inquiry (pp. 86-109).

London: Sage Publications.

• Tao, J., Fore, C., & Forbes, W. (2011). Seven best face-to-face teaching practices in a blended learning environment. Journal of Applied Learning Technology, 1(3), 20-29.

• Ugur, B., Akkoyunlu, B., & Kurbanoglu, S. (2011). Students’ opinions on blended learning and its implementation in terms of their learning styles. Education and Information Technologies, 16(1), 5-23.

• Yusuf, J. (2009). Flexible delivery issues: The case of the university of the South Pacific. Retrieved October 15, 2012, from http://www.itdl.org/Journal/Jun_09/article05.htm

Q & A

Thank You