(10) Blended Learning

Blended Learning 

After finding this article on EdWeek’s Digital Directions section I became fascinated with this new and innovative approach to teaching.  These schools have revolutionized the role filled by a teacher by eliminating traditional lesson planning and classroom instruction to put learning in the hands of the students.  I believe this mentality is a great way to encourage students to gain ownership over their knowledge and begin to develop their critical literacy and thinking skills beyond the constraints of teacher led instruction.  However great this method is for the evolution of schooling, it is obvious that our training and education models need to follow suit in an attempt to train pre-service teachers with these new techniques in mind especially since majority of their faculty is comprised of newly certified teachers.  Like taught in the majority of my education classes, I really liked that these school’s design take away emphasis on grades and instead on informally assessing and remediate the learning.  I really thought that the focus on real world application and student guided learning is exactly what is missing in most of America’s traditional classroom.  Unfortunately, it is these exact skills that are what develops children into critically thinking and educated adults that are able to function outside of the constraints of what is expected.  I thought the most important aspect of this type of design was the flexibility of lessons to cater to a specific students needs.  When we talk about differentiated lessons and assessment, teachers often overlook students’ true needs.  This type of instruction avoids that issue and doesn’t allow for students to be overlooked.  I truly believe that a teacher with this kind of tool would be able to revolutionize a students learning behaviors to their advantage.  My main concern with this type of approach would be the students’ attitude towards Internet based schooling.  Without the forced face-to-face instruction, students may become disengaged with learning and possible fall behind or out of touch.  At the same time however, this type of education is able to set the tone for the professional world these students will undoubtedly become members of.