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Instructional Resources for Library Instructors: Flex your one-shot Instruction

Instruction Modalities

Whether you are teaching a course or asked by the faculty to teach in their classroom, you might find yourself supporting materials and classroom activities in one or more of these modalities. Each modality offers unique benefits and challenges when adopted into your instruction session, and understanding the similarities and differences among these combinations can greatly prepare you for future instruction requests and teaching.

A group of students learning in a classroom on the scale of 100% in-person from the left to 100% online to the right.

Reference: A Guide to Hybrid and Blended Learning in Higher Education, World Wide Technology (2020).

This visual representation provides various teaching modalities to engage students in a classroom and instruction.

  • Face-to-face modality is typically 100% in-person and provides traditional instructor-led lectures followed by in-class activities and physical classroom materials.
  • Blended modality involves some online components and activities that build on top of some face-to-face sessions. Examples of blended learning include the station rotation, flipped classroom, and A La Carte models. 
  • Hybrid modality involves some in-person and synchronous online learning and activities replacing some face-to-face instructions. The term blended and hybrid modalities are sometimes used interchangeably. 
  • Fully online modality is when the learning, instruction, and activities take place 100% online.

There are several instructional challenges to adopting blended/hybrid instructions, such as technology barriers for learners, insufficient classroom equipment to support cross-multiple modalities, maintaining engagement for both online and in-person students synchronously, and consistency to support and implement pedagogical practices for implementing hybrid sessions. Thus, library instructors are not required to adopt hybrid instructions at this time. 

Watch this (1:45 mins) video that explains the difference between online, blended, and hybrid learning.

Reference: MBA TV - ACN. (2022, January 26). What is the difference between online, blended, and hybrid learning modes - Professor G MBA TV. Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kFC2hsuJwH0.

Modes of Interaction

The mode of interaction between student, instructor and materials

Reference: Modes of Interaction in Distance Education, Anderson & Garrison (1998).

The principal modes of instruction are student-to-student, student-to-content, and student-to-instructor. These modes of interaction for blended and hybrid modalities look much different from interactions in a traditional classroom. When re-designing your session into blended or hybrid modalities, consider the following instruction activities and interactions for student-to-instructor, student-to-content, and interaction exchanges among student-to-student.

  • Student-to-Instructor Interactions:
    • Hybrid/blended learning modalities provide a way for students to recall face-to-face interactions while learning through materials online. The instructor will determine which class activities will be online and which will be face-to-face. Common communication tools in the learning management system, like a discussion forum, help to foster the connectedness of students' learning online and in person. The instructor needs to provide frequent feedback and acknowledge students' work online and in person to increase their "online presence" and student engagement in the learning materials and encourage motivation to continue participating in the course session.
    • The instructor should assess students' readiness in hybrid/blended learning by starting with low-stakes student activities or assignments and offering a reasonable amount of workload during face-to-face and online interactions when assigning projects and assignments. 
  • Student-to-Student Interactions:
    • The instructor leads a student-to-student learning community within a class and manages expectations for peer-to-peer interactions as students become more acquainted. The instructor should gradually transition into a facilitator role in the student discussion and let the students continue the conversation and peer feedback among themselves. One way for instructors to create such an environment is to have students introduce themselves and respond to their classmates in the online forum. The students who are comfortable participating asynchronously may feel less anxious when sharing their ideas and opinions. This helps to foster a peer learning environment where the students feel connected and relatable with their peers to create a sense of belonging in the learning community. 
  • Student-to-Content interactions:
    • Hybrid/blended learning modalities allow instructors to introduce content, libraries, artifacts, and educational resources that enhance the varieties of instructional materials offered digitally compared to physical textbooks and handouts used only in the classroom. The instructor can prepare an activity for students to scaffold their learning by generating digital content to complement their understanding of the materials and learning. At the same time, the instructor has more freedom to introduce their own produced instructional materials and content customized for their students. 

Workshop Presentation & Teaching Demo

An Example of Synchronous Hybrid Model Teaching Demostration (6:20 mins):

Reference: Caroline Simpkins (2020, August 22). Hybrid Model Demonstration - Synchronous [Video]. Youtube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buHFspGyerI.

Hybrid/Hyflex Lesson Plan Examples

Visual representation to represent Hyflex course modality. It shows a group of students in a physical classroom and students learning asynchronously online.

You can find example lesson plans and instruction activities to adopt your one-shot class session into synchronous in-person, synchronous online, and asynchronous online modalities. Create a copy of the Google doc by clicking on the file tab and selecting "Make a copy."

Instructional Tools

The selection of the appropriate instructional tools is important when flexing one-shot face-to-face (F2F) instructions into hybrid/blended learning. The library instructors will have to consider the types of instruction activities currently planned for the face-to-face class session and Edtech tools that are suitable digital substitutes and would provide similar functionality to support online learning components to replace the (F2F) physical learning materials.

The library instructor should gain access to the learning management system to utilize these Edtech tools effectively in faculty courses and ensure they are integrated and enabled inside the faculty's course shell. 

These tools help to enhance instructional activities to connect and engage students from across multiple modalities and support various instructional purposes and usage. For these tools to be practical for the faculty and students, the library instructor should work with faculty to provide introductory tutorials on the tools for students to learn within the course or use tools that the students are familiar using. 

Here is a list of instructional activity examples and the types of edtech tools that support blended/synchronous hybrid modalities:

  • Brainstorm - Padlet, Jamboard, Google Slides.
  • Collaboration on assignments/projects/presentations - Google doc/slides, Canva 
  • Group Discussions - Canvas (Gauchospace) discussion forum and Nectir.
  • Video Feedback - Flipgrid, Zoom, Panopto.
  • Recordings - Zoom or Panopto.
  • Knowledge check/assessment - Poll software, Kahoot, Google form, Qualtrics.

References