Hybrid vs. Face to Face - Does it effect Instructional Design?

I've done a lot of thinking over the past few months about whether I could picture myself teaching in a hybrid environment or whether I would feel more comfortable working solely in a face-to-face environment, and I have to tell you I'm torn. But I think what made me think harder about it was the concept of Instructional Design and how it can impact both sorts of environments. And the more I thought about how I could use different elements of the Fink model in my classroom planning in my future career path, I could see the differences that I as an instructor would have to make to make the design of the course work for the platform it's being taught in.

For instance...in an hybrid environment where you're only seeing students every so often, you really need to know how to read a students actions online to see if they are grasping the concepts presented. And if you aren't quick about seeing that someone isn't on the same page as everyone else, there's a good possibility that that student will fall by the wayside. You (as an instructor) need to be more intuitive as to what's going on in that online environment. You need to make sure that the resources you are posting are presenting material in a variety of different ways so that multiple students with different learning strengths can grasp the concepts. The tricky part is that you won't know if they are grasping the concepts until they post to discussions that show that they are understanding the material given.

To the contrary...a face-to-face environment allows you to see the students interact with the material that you have given them from the get-go. Facial expressions and actions in the classroom are huge factors to me, as someone who can quickly pick up on facial expression and body movement. In a face-to-face environment you are also given the opportunity to understand the students learning styles better as you are dealing with them one on one (to a certain extent) on a regular basis. Your instructional design for a course could be drastically different in a face-to-face environment because if most of your learners are visual learners, you could limit your resources to the more visual, and not auditory or literary.

It all goes back to knowing who your audience is and setting firm goals to refer back to. If you know your audience and know your goals, instructional design as a whole can become a lot easier. You as an instructor can relay more information to your students by knowing their strengths and weaknesses. Though I see the pluses of a hybrid environment I can see if being trickier to gauge students and their learning disabilities unless you are able to get from the student what their learning strengths are.

My point here is that Instructional Design is slightly dependant on the environment you are working in, and the platform in which you are teaching. I feel that to be a good instructor, you need to have the best tools and resources for your students at their fingertips...but it's hard to do that without knowing who the student is and what they are able to get out of the material you provide them. You need to be open to changing the design of a course if the group isn't grasping a concept or has been lead off track. Instructional Design is about flexibility and patience. You may not get it right the first go round, but make changes to it as you go to best suite your goals as an instructor and the goals of the students.

Instructional Design - A Framework

The readings this week were eye-opening for me. Not being an educator, it's interesting for me to see educators map things out in such a concise way for others to use. What interested me most was how similar, yet different these ideas/suggested framework should be.

But even though there were some minor differences, they maintained some common ground. The idea that learning goals for both the instructor and the student being concrete places to start was something that I found useful. It's hard to even start designing a course unless you (the instructor) really have a handle on what types of things you are hoping to achieve in the course before you design it.

The design that seemed to best suite an instructors views and needs in my opinion was the Fink model. It's foundation was simple. Goals, so that both the student and the instructor know what they are working for, assessment so that you can maintain the objectives of the goal and activities, to make things come together and to cater to the different learning styles that are prevalent in a classroom. By keeping design simple, this model proves that you can achieve what you want to in a classroom without compromising anything.

As someone who isn't that familiar with instructional design, the Fink model seemed the most realistic. It was something that I can easily work with and see myself referring back to at later points in my career. It's something that I hope to refer back to within this course as things progress as well.