I have completed the first week this was extremely valuable and very informative. It is supporting my journey in discovering the art of designing and developing a blended learning course. I have seen the courses from the different perspective of the teacher and learner. Noticing how the design aspects of teacher input on the course affects the engagement and expected output of the learner.

There has been a significant amount of mobile technology used in moble phones teachers and students and tablets. I was surprised by this use, but it appeared to work.

Another aspect that was discussed was flip learning, a pedagogical approach, where the learners are set a task to read, watch or research and come prepared to discus or put into action in the face to face session (Bergmman & Sams 2012). This supports inclusion allowing learning at the individuals pace when and where they have time and on the move.

Now to consider the course content.

Breakdown of week one;

1. Welcome, 2 videos and an Glossary to update
2. What is blended learning? A video and 2 links to exercises.
3. Teachers and Learners, 2 videos and an article.
4. Summary– links to update course and summing up as below.

In summing up the week from the blog post, discussions and debates, the course leader Laurillard (2019) stated the following:

“The general consensus seems to be that the broad and inclusive definitions of blended learning are useful, but it’s the teacher’s responsibility to make sure the mix is optimal. For example:

• to encourage learners to use blended learning for independent study by guiding them on how to do it
• to motivate learners to do it by following through in class to use what they did.”

This is how I see the blended learning taking place, but accept that for some learners there may be barriers in the use of technology termed ‘Digital Literacy’ and the availability of the equipment termed the ‘Digital Divide’ (Poore 2016).

As an example of an exercise carried out, on the course, below is a link to the Padlet wall that was produced for the first week.

References

Bergmann, J. and Sams, A. (2012) Flip Your Classroom: Reach Every Student in Every Class Every Day. International Society for Technology in Education. Google Books

Laurillard, D., (2019) Summary of the week. [Online] Available at Future Learn. Accessed 27-2-19

Poore, M., (2016). Using Social Media in the Classroom: A Best Practice Guide. Sage. London. Google books.