Blended Learning Environments- Week 11

 Blended Learning Environment

 

 

"Students who need more flexibility in their schedules, want real world learning situations or need a confidence boost are well suited for blended learning, said Stacy Hawthorne"- Tanya Rosocrla

In a blended classroom, the students have more flexibility in their education than in a traditional classroom. For these students, a part of their day is spent in the classroom where they can receive face to face instruction from their teachers, and the other part of the day they are able to have online instruction. No two blended learning environments are alike, as each is made specifically to fit the needs of that classroom of students. I believe that having a blended classroom is so essential for any classroom because there is such a high demand for people to have technological skills. I also believe it is important because it does allow students to have more freedom with their learning which is a great way to keep them engaged and interested.

 

In our Educational Technology class we also have a blended learning environment. We are able to learn in our own environment and at our own pace. We hear lectures from a variety of diverse people who know the field of education and the integration of technology well. The one thing that I could see that might need to be improved would be more face to face interactions with the professor for this class, because that is still a big part of a blended learning classroom. The fact that it is all online can also be overwhelming to a student who learns much better with face to face interactions where they are able to ask questions freely.

 

This week we heard our lecture from Stacy Hawthorne about building blended learning environments. During her lecture, I found it very interesting when she started to talk about the different types of blended learning environments. There are some that are very minimal without interrupting the daily schedule and there are others where students only come to school for half a day and the other half they are able to work on their own.  This was very interesting to me because I thought that there was only one way to blend the classroom. This shows me that every teacher has a different teaching style so they will decide how they will instruction, helping me understand why certain things happen in the classroom. Knowing this enables me to better understand my teachers and their instruction.