Managing HyFlex can be a juggling act. 

The idea of simultaneously managing students in front of you, students joining class live via online web conferencing software, and students that choose to learn asynchronously might seem scary. The unknown element of which students will choose which learning mode may also leave you feeling uncertain about how to plan lessons week by week throughout the semester.

You may be concerned that you are going to serve one group of learners at the expense of the other group, or even worse, fail to serve any group in terms of the excellent teaching you are used to delivering in a single delivery mode. This is a concern many faculty express about HyFlex teaching.

Luckily, there are several course management strategies you can use to create a positive and engaging learning environment for all students while creating a work environment that is enjoyable for you as an educator.

The following 4-minute video from educators at the University of Windsor may provide some inspiration from the recent experiences of post-secondary HyFlex experimenters.

High Praise for HyFlex: Teaching & Learning in the COVID-19 pandemic [3:50] Video Transcript [.docx]

Keep in mind that results may vary. These instructors may have more (or less) support than you have available at your institution. Your course teaching needs may be quite different than those depicted. Overall, the idea of this video is “give it a try”. It won’t be perfect the first, or possibly even the tenth time, but you will gain skills and confidence, which go a long way.

High-quality teaching should be the goal. 

There are many teaching methods that may contribute to successfully managing the HyFlex course environment. As you have probably discovered by now, there is not a single “right” strategy; however, a good starting point would be to focus on Brian Beatty’s three aspects of high-quality teaching: relevant and meaningful content, engaging students in memorable activities/learning experiences, and assessing students/student self-assessments.

You will find specific strategies and suggested class activities for each aspect below.

Include relevant and meaningful content

A key strategy for managing a successful HyFlex teaching and learning environment is the preparation of a robust and helpful course LMS. Your course LMS should, in part, be repositories of well-curated, current, and relevant content. The content in your course may include your own writing or recorded videos of you, but you should definitely not be the only voice students hear or the only face that they see (as intriguing as you may be). Diversity is an important part of relevant and meaningful content.

It is important that students see themselves in the courses they take. 

Consider using quality content from underrepresented creators (women, Indigenous writers and artists, LGBTQ++ writers and artists, discipline experts from countries other than your own) and visual representations of people of all colours and ages. This diversity will help ensure your students are exposed to global perspectives and begin to see themselves as capable experts in your discipline.

Design and populate your course LMS as a toolkit that is useful to you and your students for your weekly topics and deliverables. Be clear about what content is required and what is optional.

If you have been teaching the same courses or types of courses for a while, you have likely developed a wide collection of required and supplemental resources that are relevant for student learning. You may have a core textbook, go-to videos, articles, web pages, audio content and other content strategies that you’ve tested with students over time.

If you do not have a deep collection of diverse, relevant, and meaningful content for your courses, there’s a willing and engaged group right in front of you every week that can help you build – your students. Consider what “meaningful” content means to you and ask your students what meaningful content means for them.

It is important to consider that those might be different definitions.

Leverage the diversity, interests, prior knowledge, and capacity of your students to help each other learn through review and curation of useful content. Peers helping peers not only aids with managing multiple modes of teaching but also empowers students to retain their learning more effectively.

Rather than standing alone at the front of the classroom, you are engaged with a group of learners that have prior knowledge and enjoy sharing it with others. As the course knowledge leader, provide guidance and feedback, set expectations of high quality versus low-quality content, and support their skills of digital literacy for searching and discerning.

Engage students in memorable activities and learning experiences

Learning can be fun. Repeat, learning can be fun. There are several engagement strategies that can help make learning more memorable for students and more interesting for you as you facilitate their learning.

In previous units, ideas for engagement technology have been shared. Review those ideas and consider what engagement activities align with your topics and learning practice strategies.

In this section, you will consider how humans learn, what might increase learning retention, and expand/deepen student interest in your discipline through intrinsic motivation.

While there are a variety of engaging activities you may choose for the HyFlex environment, remember this: students want to be active and creative in their learning. They want to experience curiosity and intrinsic motivation. They seek to learn because the topics are interesting to them, rather than simply wanting a high grade.

The readings and concepts above are just a start on the many discipline-specific ways you might engage learners as co-creators in your course and empower them to tell stories, create projects, and learn more in their communities.

Assess students in meaningful and impactful ways

In Module 1, you explored HyFlex assessments within the primary context of course outcome/objective alignment. In this section, take a deeper dive into collaborative and self-assessment strategies that help bridge the spaces between in-person, synchronous online, and asynchronous students. Issues of academic integrity in HyFlex courses will also be shared in this section.

A key feature of reusable assignments is that students may use it as a portfolio piece or they may grant you permission to use it as a high-quality example for future students. They might consider posting it publicly on a blog or sharing it with others if it is a useful element of learning. For example, students may have created infographics or other visual learning materials that would benefit other learners.

Reusable assignments are perfect for peer feedback and self-assessment.

When students take pride in what they are creating, they also seek to continuously improve it. Use rubrics and guidance for how quality is defined in the context of the assignment, what it means to review a project and how to provide positive, meaningful feedback.

An additional feature of personally relevant assignments where collaboration and peer feedback are encouraged is academic integrity. The more you seek projects and assignments where students tell their stories about their interests and provide reflections on their learning, and where active collaboration is sought in the form of peer feedback, the more challenging it is for students to use the work of others.

Just reading the words academic integrity in the context of HyFlex course design and teaching is likely somewhat anxiety-inspiring. Designing and helping to ensure academic rigour in digital teaching and learning contexts can be challenging and frustrating for educators. One interesting movement for reducing concerns about academic integrity is intentional global issues and strategies of student collaboration to inspire and engage learners.

Another way to incorporate global issues when designing meaningful and impactful assessments is to consider the United Nations 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Create assignments and self-assessment opportunities where students choose the goals that matter to them personally and then apply the topics and skills they are exploring in your course to these interests. How might students do this in groups?

The following 10-minute video created in 2020 provides an intro to the SDGs and a few early ideas on how you might use them as collaborative assignment foundations.

SDGs OER20 [10:32] Video Transcript [.docx]

Unit Summary

In this unit, you have explored several possibilities for managing the HyFlex teaching environment in student-centred ways by incorporating relevant and meaningful content, engaging students with memorable (and hopefully fun) active learning methods, and considering ways to assess students that reduce concerns about academic integrity. Rather than adapting your course, content, and activities for students that you have not yet met, you can focus on seeking student input while you are teaching, learning with and from them.

Managing HyFlex teaching and learning can be more effective by prioritizing student involvement and empowering them to manage their own learning with you as their guide. When that type of learning environment is present, it doesn’t matter quite as much whether it is face-to-face, sychronous online, or online asynchronous; student engagement is a high probability.