1. Interaction in Hybrid Courses Rosemary Capps, UC Davis February 29, 2012

2. Agenda  Housekeeping  Building collaboration and presence:  What’s working now?  What tools are available?  Breakout rooms: Analyze working examples  Group presentations  Application and extension:  Either “workshop” a hybrid activity  Or discuss handling distractions and distracted students  Homework: Read Dyrud; create a netiquette guide, a hybrid activity, and a Carnegie justification for ICMS

3. Housekeeping  Technology tour  Where are we in the workshop series?  Where do we want to be in April?  Follow-up insights or questions:  Universal Design  Case studies  West, “A Student’s Guide to Strengthening an Online Community”

4. Why build community? Collaboration, community, presence Student engagement Learning mastery, persistence to degree achievement

5. What does building community require?

6. Discuss in groups.  What do you currently use to build community in your face-to-face courses?  How do you currently set ground rules for these interactions?  What kinds of interactions do you expect to move online or keep face-to-face?  Take notes in the breakout room notepad.  Discuss for 10 minutes, then nominate a presenter to report to the whole group in 60 seconds or less.  If you need help, use the chat box that says “send message to hosts.”

7. What is presence?  The degree to which an individual is perceived and perceives himself or herself as “real” in a space  Social and intellectual connection  Student to student, to instructor, to content  A sense that the instructor is walking me through the experience  Can happen in a good lecture, lab, seminar, or online activity  Examples:  www.PhinisheD.org www.PhinisheD.org  ECS 30 Facebook page

8. Which settings allow which interactions? Setting/ToolSynch/AsynchEditableArchivedOther Discussion board Usually asynchronous Can beYesThreaded discussions BlogChronological asynchronous Can beYesText, images, multimedia, ChatUsually synchronous Usually notCan beIM, texting, chatrooms Collaboration tools EitherYes WikisWikis, Google docs, TitanPadGoogle docsTitanPad Voice or visual communication SynchronousUsually notCan beWebinars, SkypeWebinars, Skype, SecondLife SecondLife Social mediaEitherYes TwitterTwitter, FB, RSS, Google+FBGoogle+ Face-to-face settings SynchronousNoUsually notWe’ve used it for centuries!

9. Explore some examples.  What kinds of interaction could occur online?  Student/student  Student/instructor  Student/content  What kinds of interaction could occur face-to-face?  How and to what degree does presence exist?  Would this work or help in my own hybrid class?  Which other tools might fit better with my personality or discipline?

10. Discuss in groups.  In your breakout rooms, nominate a timekeeper. You have 40 minutes to discuss four examples, answering four questions about each example.  Follow the links on your respective computers, and use Adobe Connect for to discuss using voice and chat.  Take notes in the breakout room notepad.  Nominate a presenter to report to the whole group in a 3-5 minute summary.  If you need help, use the chat box that says “send message to hosts.”

11. In small groups, “workshop” a hybrid activity for one of the courses in your group. As a whole group, discuss logistical challenges to student engagement (distracted students, scaling up, etc.). Choose the next activity:

12. Create a hybrid activity.  In your breakout rooms, choose one of the courses under design in your group.  As a group, create a hybrid activity for that course.  Align the activity with course-level and module-level learning objectives.  Use the matrix of tool-types to take advantage of possible interactions…but don’t overload. Only add tools that are necessary.  Plan for set-up and transition.

13. Consider challenges to engagement.  “In the last year I have made the decision to ban open laptops in my classes. I teach two undergrad classes of approx 20 students and one larger of about 100 where I’ve instituted this policy. (I teach design for theatre and film classes and I assume many are taking these classes for fun – I have a cross section of students from all areas.) I did this because I was seeing a distinct drop in student performance directly related to surfing the web and I found it to be a big distraction when students weren’t engaged with what was going on in class. I admit my own addiction to electronic devices and know it’s difficult to tear myself away–I now call the break a “text break” and this seems to relieve some tension with this policy. I believe if a student has another priority he/she needs to make the choice about coming to my class or working on something else. I also think in some cases it’s just habit and and an electronic addiction. BTW-I have not had one complaint about this policy–(that I’ve heard anyway).” [continued]

14. How to address engagement challenges?  [Continued] “Here is what I put in my syllabus: “Classroom decorum and etiquette: A new rule — No open laptops or electronic devices in class. Activity not related to classroom instruction such as phone calls, texting, emailing, surfing the web, talking unnecessarily during lectures, etc. is distracting to other students and the instructor and takes time and attention away from your educational experience. (Anecdotally, I have found that students who surf the web during class time have been getting lower grades. I will try to have “text breaks.”) You will be allowed to use computers when needed for project research and presentations. Generally, I will ask students to leave class if they create disruptions. Additional policies posted on our class Smartsite.”

15. How to address engagement challenges?  The connection-distraction challenge:  How might connection-distraction manifest in a hybrid course?  How might it vary depending on the learner population— lower division, upper division, grad students, others?  How might you balance the “no laptops” policy with the goal of integrating the online and face-to-face portions of your course?  How might you explain this to students in your syllabus?

16. Homework  Read Dyrud (2001), “Group Projects and Peer Review”  Create for your syllabus:  A netiquette guide, as in the West article:  How will you let students know what’s expected of them in course interactions?  A hybrid activity:  Align the activity with course-level and module-level learning objectives.  Use the matrix of tool-types to take advantage of possible interactions, but don’t overload. Only add necessary tools.  Plan for set-up and transition.  A Carnegie justification for ICMS:  How much time do you expect students to spend each week on each of your learning activities?