Towards a HyFlex Model of Teaching and Learning in Adult Language, Literacy, Numeracy and Digital (ALLND) Education

In October 2020, I published a series of notes and slides on a presentation I gave for the Learning for Employment (LfE) Consortium in Western Melbourne about developments in my initial online learning model which was hastily prompted by the appearance of COVID-19 and subsequent need for classes to migrate online. 

The presentation focused heavily on the need to facilitate collaborative work and communicative opportunities among Adult Literacy, Language, Numeracy and Digital Skills (ALLND) students rather than keeping them in isolation at home "studying" with a paper based workbook or electronic equivalent. It also outlined the logistical problems of delivering and retrieving print based materials to and from students which I immediately identified as a limiting factor for learning. The low level of effective group interaction was also indicated in the approaches I had observed taken by many providers of adult education, forced as they were to pivot to online delivery for the first time with some teachers having little or no training or experience.

I explored and presented ways in which greater levels and types of interactions between teacher and student, student and student and even students and family members or friends could be introduced into learning. A brief recapitulation of parts of this approach:

De-Centred Virtual Classroom

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A mini-class convened by the teacher in which students review and screen share their work. The teacher can start the process and teleport out to other mini-classes or sessions.

Teaching students to form online study circles and mini-classes in which they direct some of their own learning has been a valuable addition to whole class synchronous sessions over the last year or so.

Time carved out to work individually with students on materials sent electronically, learning plans, review of writing, conversation and the like (while others may be engaged in their study circles or be doing some self paced work) provided a third pillar to the initial approach and subsequent developments. 

Read more about my approach at:

https://dalepobegateaching.blogspot.com/2021/03/learning-circles-extending-study-skills.html

and https://dalepobegateaching.blogspot.com/2020/06/week-8-bringing-individual-learning.html

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A one-on-one session in which teacher and student negotiate a learning plan.
A de-centred approach allows for time gains, a broader spread of teacher attention and arguably, better outcomes for all.

The attendant problems associated with the distribution, collection and correcting of print based materials during that period - as well as the issue of many teachers not knowing how to facilitate an effective virtual class, was on my mind. I did, however, see the practical side of producing sufficient materials or  "workbooks" for students but knew activities had to be created that were effective and not just limited to reading comprehension and flat grammar exercises. Why wouldn't we maintain similar classroom practices and norms by including interactions through technology that were communicative, pair or group centred, that engineered potential for some joint research, sharing and review of work? What simple tools were available to allow students to continue learning together? It was not just about using new technologies but thinking carefully about the nature of tasks being set and how to include group interaction rather than the individuals being left to navigate materials alone.

The new situation also provided an opportunity to test other ways of teaching - not always having to be the one who is front and centre of attention but to be more dispersed orchestrating different kinds of learning structures ranging from individual one on one to formations of students planning and meeting themselves whether it be on the phone, through email, chat, WhatsApp or Zoom. 

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This is video snippet gives some idea of how I typically designed activities using Google Docs to which students could be assigned to work together on a common project or task.  The activity being discussed is one in which the paired students work individually and together on parts of a challenge - in this case, locating and finding out about the teacher's favourite icecream. They need to describe it, find out where it is produced, where it is available and how to get to the supermarket where it is sold. (The range of transferable language and technology skills here are fairly obvious).

The students also have a further opportunity to talk about their  answers and the set tasks as a whole group in a second  ZOOM class scheduled for later that week. So you can see that the material is covered in a variety of ways, with a range of skills being developed and many inputs being included from across the class over the week. The video also provides the students with points of comparison between their answers, those of the teacher and other answers from other workbooks the teacher might share with the class in the video (or in ZOOM later on).

It also provides precious time gains for the teacher, convenience and
structure for students as they work individually and collaboratively.

View some of the video at: https://youtu.be/aB4s8HzM0y4

The results I am still getting from students, their satisfaction with the flexibility and variety it provides got me thinking how my teaching might look in the longer term. 

What I asked myself then as Covid restrictions eased and students started returning to f-2-f classes in limited numbers was  "why would we now jettison the changes and gains made during the worst of the pandemic?" Did a return to the bricks and mortar classroom mean abandoning more flexible ways of working? Why would you give up the possibilities that online learning provides - even if you are primarily operating out of the face to face classroom?

Is actual attendance always the best option for those who might also work, live remotely, have limited transport options, have disabilities or struggle with illness, have complex family and caring arrangements? There are those who can attend some days but not others. Of course there are very real advantages to be gained in attending an actual class and there are activities and personal interactions that cannot be easily replicated virtually. But why can’t we work and develop pedagogy somewhere in the middle? Why can't we design an approach that caters to variety of complex, adult needs and circumstances?

A Hybrid Approach 

There was a brief period in 2021 when f-2-f classes were able to return for one day a week. 

Two other days of class were conducted online. 

In that time I found myself wanting to use the f-2-f time we had together as best we could for certain activities but not de-couple the learning from the types of communicative online activities that were working so well. I also anticipated that some students would not want to attend or could not attend due to COVID-19 (10 of the 15 students I taught in that time fell sick) so how could I cater in these complicated circumstances? 

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Continuing to access materials in the face to face classroom with a workbook of QR codes. 
Students attending remotely were able to access the same workbook through Google Docs.
Activities were designed to include students attending face to face and remotely. They worked collaboratively through learning circles. Some activities were individually based and could be completed by the "absent" students in a self paced fashion.
The next logical step would have been to stream the class live to those attending remotely and facilitate some of the activities synchronously between the two groups. The aim was to maximize possibilities for student interaction through a rich blend of study activities and learning arrangements.

The students were mostly able and willing to work from home but now instead of being able to connect with others virtually, they would be be excluded for the duration of their time in quarantine. This is an obvious downside of a delivery mode that requires all students to be physically present at the same time and in the same place. If you are going to have a face to face class, students who are either sick or unable to attend physically, still need to be to attend or keep up some other way. 

I created workbook is sent to the online students by email or WhatsApp - there are links and QRs and instructions about making contact and communicating with the teacher and other class members so the work can be completed in a similar fashion to the way it is in the "real" classroom but in a much more flexible, time friendly fashion.

Either way, the students were working f-2-f and online with most of the collaborative activities being designed to allow students who could not attend to plug into work groups out of hours. 

What my model tried to achieve was a blurring of the boundaries between the f-2-f classroom and online classrooms - learning is approached from both angles no matter where the students are located and what time they have available. 

I now realise we were moving towards a form of “Hyflex” teaching and learning which unfortunately, I did not have the opportunity to continue developing.

As it turned out, the surging pandemic put an end to that brief blended experiment and the students went back to studying fully online for the rest of the year as infection numbers soared. 

Predictably, the pivot to returning online was not a problem for them. It was simply a return to the online modes in which they were well versed. The structure and arrangements for learning were clear and well understood. The learners took up from where they left off the term before. Ironically, there was less disruption to learning for those who fell sick during the brief period in which we were able to return to class physically. 

The question now is could the hybrid model described above be taken that step further? Could we actually transform delivery by providing students with even greater levels of choice and access? Imagine being able to also stream to remotely located students on top of using the other strategies described. 

This is the crossroads at which I now find myself but fear the almost total snap back to face to face delivery across all sectors of education will preclude the potential for further developing the hybrid model which worked for both me and my students in 2021.

What is Hyflex?

HyFlex is an approach which tries to combine or mix a use of modes to maximize opportunities for study. It is a form of teaching in which some students are in the classroom and others attend remotely - or both. There are different graduations and levels of synchronous and asynchronous, individual and group work as well as engagement with the teacher which takes place. By streaming the class in real time another option is added to students participating remotely. 

In a recent forum, I addressed the concerns of parents of immuno-compromised children who were nervous about their kids returning to the f-2-f classroom because of escalating prevalence of Covid across the community - at the time of writing almost 40 000 cases a day!

I commented:

What is disappointing right across Education - regardless of the sector - is the missed opportunity to introduce a HyFlex approach that could cater to a range of students with varying and diverse needs. By HyFlex, I mean forms of delivery which are either

1) fully face-to-face,
2) part f-2-f / part online,
3) fully online with real time streaming to students remotely located at home or elsewhere
4) fully online self paced
5) flexible, customised variations of the above which students can move in and out of. 

We have the technology to roll out such a model and with some thoughtful planning and teacher PD, could revolutionise the way we deliver across the educational spectrum. But that’s not going to happen is it, with the great snap back to the tired status quo of traditional schooling? Why are we so stuck on pushing an industrial era model of education that is largely out of date, inflexible and incapable of properly serving us at such a critical time?

Imagine if we could organise these delivery variations and provide a whole range of students with genuine choice and flexibility? 

I have no doubt that the level of planning and preparation would add greatly to workload of a teacher. An issue that needs a lot of attention in itself. Hyflex also involves a investment in technology for live streaming but I think even more crucially, a very substantial upskilling of teachers. 

And yet what alternatives do we really have in such uncertain times? 

The centre will not hold as far as traditional, classroom delivery is concerned. 

Post Script September 2022: Now in what some (erroneously) call the “post-pandemic” period, most students have returned to long days of face to face study. Absenteeism is rife, teachers are regularly sick themselves and at times educational programs seem to be at crisis point - right across Education. 

It appears, however, that inventive, flexible ways of moving forward do not actually have much traction or support. There has been a definite shift back to the classroom and almost dismissal of online delivery as a failure or at best a necessary evil or last resort in the event of a total meltdown. 

Ironically, the health emergency exposed a great deal that was wrong with education and offered some new ways forward. My personal sense of the situation is that the opportunity to create a more responsive teaching/learning pedagogy is quickly disappearing as we move back to “normal” life and learning again.  

Week 11 —- Assessment “Crisis” - Some thoughts about my approach during COVID

Managing assessment remotely with language learners who are challenged by the technology is hard. Not only language but digital skills are being developed in less than ideal circumstances during the COVID-19 pandemic. There has been insufficient preparation for the students to easily engage with the media through which the assessments are being delivered. Progress is being made. I think it is observing my students develop the skills to access and return the materials, rather than the tasks themselves, which is most fascinating - and valuable. 

There are now ‘smart’ automated means to assess, analytics that can applied, a range of whizz bang apps and platforms potentially at a teacher’s disposal. And if only I had a software engineer as a volunteer to help me out ...my worries would be sorted.

Though seriously, in this situation where crisis management is the order of the day, one has to ask how realistic it is to incorporate more interactive and automated tools from a distance with my low level learners? 

Like Kalantzis and Cope I dream of a day when the ability to track learner progress formatively through Artificial Intelligence and intensive data collection at each point of a learning cycle becomes common. This will be a time when summative assessment approaches will be left for dead, or at least be subsumed into an over-arching, formative assessment process. 

Put simply, those dreadful, one-off, classroom staged, paper based tests that we pretend are somehow indicative of broad skill development over time really need to go. As ‘assessments’ they actually provide us with very little information about what students know or are capable of doing.

Our goal should be to make assessment integral to all learning insofar as continuous feedback would be provided and progress tracked. Assessment would then become so pervasive that it all-but disappears. Literacies are an ideal site for the development of such a seamlessly integrated learning and assessment environment. What if we move all assessment data collection into the space of learning? Then all we would ever measure is the substance of learning. There could be no need for after-the-event inferences, because what we are doing is measuring learning itself, at its source. And the more data we collect, and the more we view this data through the greatest variety of lenses, the more valid and reliable our assessments will become.

From Cope, B., Kalantzis, “Technology-Mediated Writing Assessments: Paradigms and Principles.” Computers and Composition 28:79-96.

But reality intervenes. I feel I am in an odd situation with my learners who have been thrown into the online “deep end”. 

For me, the approach has been to design and collect a number of varying, formative tasks which have been prepared for through research and work with others. The assessments have been returned to me across the term, I correct them, collate them and convert them into complete PDFs for each individual. I am limited by having to make reference to a range of Elements, Required Knowledge and Skills outlined in standardised tests. So there are obvious constraints and parameters to work within. I am stuck with one foot in the world of a tired traditional approach, the other online (with my head in the clouds?)

On the practical delivery level, all assessment tasks are finally transferred to a shared folder that my coordinator can access, download and process at her end.

I have to admit, my dreamy head is spinning. 

It has taken me a lot of time gathering all the parts, collating and converting. (In the future all of this could be done by a bot or some form of AI - oh yes, please 😂) but I’m stuck having to cope with this alone for the time being. 

There are a range of technical challenges and I’ve brought in some ‘industrial strength’ conversion and compression software to deal with huge file types emailed or messaged to me by the students and/or their “home-schooler/helpers”. These helpers are usually their  (grand)kids and this impressive collaborative work, (considering my students knew little or nothing about ways of conveying files electronically), is precisely the type of relevant, hands on learning we should be promoting.

There are also official cover sheets requiring signatures and various sections that need to be completed by the teacher that need to be integrated for compliance purposes. Pages are missing, further communication has had to occur - and that takes a lot more time to rectify than it normally would. 

It should be remembered that my adult language learners do not (as yet) have the skills to work in the same way as young, tech savvy college students. 

They started studying online with a single week’s notice and very limited training. At best what can be hoped for is the gradual initiation into ‘smarter’ ways of working. 

What’s required is a revolution in our approach to both classroom based teaching and assessment that I believe will eventually filter down into the adult literacy, language, numeracy and basic education field.

Again, I am in agreement with Cope and Kalantzis, 

...curricula and assessments in their traditional formats and media are in need of updating in order to make optimal use of the affordances of these digital spaces, and to create learning and assessment environments which are manifestly contemporary in the communicative options they allow.”

(Op.cit)

Week 6 —- Communication and Assessment through Video Rooms

I was loathe to upset the apple cart. I had established a fairly simple and reliable form of delivery combining my blog for Workbook downloads, email for additional support, phone and SMS for daily contact, a weekly correction video via YouTube and Review Quiz via Google Forms. Would introducing a synchronous layer complicate an arrangement that was working well?

 

Assessments, however, loomed and I wondered how I would go about negotiating this with students. How would I “talk my students through the tasks” as they really do require additional verbal support to fully understand what they need to do? I could achieve this through phone discussion perhaps but that in itself is not a perfect solution as there is something of a disconnect between the visual and the verbal. By that I mean I want them to “see” the task in front of them as we closely look, ponder the subtleties and discuss it together - just as you would in the classroom.

I’d also been looking forward to some interaction wth the students, some virtual FaceTime, to make up for the social interaction we have lost.

Discounting that synchronous possibility would be a mistake.

I’ve met those two challenges by using Messenger Video Rooms - which have only just appeared online. What’s great is that students don’t need to download any app or program, be users of Messenger or any other Facebook products.

You can simply supply a link (in this case by email) have them enter their names into the window that appears before them in a browser and join the room as a guest.

There were a few glitches. Some students were locked out for a while but I think I’ve remedied that problem now. Make sure you keep the room “unlocked” in your Messenger Video Room Settings.

I was really happy that two of my weakest students were able to join me and that by using my iPad I could give them a bit of a tour of my house and garden, as well as the insides of my fridge 😱 to get them relaxed and talking! We then went on to discuss the tasks. On the other hand, my brightest student was on to  Video Rooms in no time ...and has already submitted the first task! I’m now looking forward to experimenting with these rooms for structured oral practice.

There are a range of issues pertaining to principles of assessment, particularly validity and reliability, that could be raised. I am, however, much more concerned with the issue of fairness for those thrown into a chaotic situation for which they were not really prepared. With that said, I’m amazed at how well my students are performing in these conditions that are new and challenging.

I’ve been discussing with colleagues the types of adjustments that need to be factored into assessing remotely in terms of presentation, support, collection and documentation. Our judgements cannot be formed without taking the new learning environment into account. Much of what I see in other places looks hidebound and messy - old world summative approaches that won’t and don’t work neatly in this online context. I think the best assessment in this crisis situation needs to be gradual, formative, inventive and flexible.