Imagine a classroom where students don’t just sit in rows and listen to a teacher teach for 40 minutes or so.
Instead, the teacher only gives direct instruction to small groups of students at a time, which enables her to offer each of them more individual attention.
In another part of the classroom, other students are collaborating in small groups to help each other master concepts she already taught them.
And in the back of the room, students sit at computers to pursue the same subject matter independently, also reinforcing what the teacher is doing.
Every 10 minutes or so, all the students rotate to another one of those three stations.
This very well may be the future of education, at least in Parkland School District.
The concept that already has transformed some classrooms at Parkland is called blended learning.
This school year, the district embarked on a blended learning pilot program that got rave reviews — both live and on video — from students, teachers, administrators and school board members during Tuesday night’s school board meeting.
Parkland may be the only local school district pursuing blended learning on such a large scale.
Eight hundred of Parkland’s 9,200 students are involved in the pilot program this year, reported Tracy Smith, assistant to the superintendent for operations.
The blending learning approach to education is being done by seven teachers in Parkland High School, three at Orefield Middle School and three at Springhouse Middle School.
“This is going to grow; we will be expanding this,” said Smith.
“We feel this is the future of learning. Next year we’re going to expand to 24 additional classrooms. We’re also going to be expanding this to the elementary level as well.
“Teachers are coming to us and saying ‘we would like to be part of this’ because they’ve heard how well it’s working.”
Smith said benchmark scores are showing that students in blended learning classrooms “are performing at a higher level.”
She also noted: “We haven’t had one student say they want to go back to traditional learning. All of them say they like this better.”
The educational value of blended learning was praised by Kate Robbins, a math teacher at Parkland High: “I’m confident that our students have gained a deeper understanding than they have in the past, a stronger mastery of the material.”
Smith said the real measure of academic improvement from blended learning will come in April when students take PSSA and Keystone Exams.
She said other schools that have been doing blending learning for two or three years have seen improved testing results.
That was confirmed by Kevin Dellicker, president of Dellicker Strategies, Parkland’s blended learning consultant, who told the school board: “We’ve been doing these types of models for three years now. So far, 94 percent of the schools that have taken standardized tests using hybrid instruction have outperformed traditional classrooms.”
Board comments
School board member David Kennedy was assured the district did not just put “cream of the crop” students into the pilot blended learning classes and leave kids behind who actually may need more one-on-one attention than they get in traditional classrooms.
Board member Robert Cohen praised everyone involved in the blended learning pilot, saying: “You make us all proud to be doing such exemplary work.”
“Fantastic!” agreed board member Lisa Adams.
“Once again, at Parkland we’ve raised the bar,” said board president Roberta Marcus.
The blend of blended learning
The blend of blended learning combines the best of curriculum, teaching methodology and instructional technology, explained Smith.
“This is transforming how we teach, using technology. Technology is the tool to enable the teachers to know their students better, to modify and adjust their instruction on a regular basis. They’re really individualizing the instruction, using the technology.”
But Smith told the school board blended learning “is really not a technology initiative per se. It’s about creating environments that are more student-centered, engaging and, ultimately, impactful. It’s about great teaching and learning.”
Smith continued: “It’s really about engaging the students. We’re seeing really high levels of student engagement because of small groups, because of teachers having the strong relationships.”
Three stations explained
By only teaching six or seven students at a time at the teacher-led station, Robbins said: “The quality of instruction has really improved.
“The students are more engaged. There are far fewer distractions during instruction and we can move through the material in a totally different way than we used to.”
“The teacher can focus on higher order of thinking skills and personal interactions you can’t get in a lecture environment,” said Dellicker.
Robbins said students’ understanding of the subject matter taught is enhanced by the work that they do at the collaborative and independent stations.
The collaborative station “is like real life, it’s your job,” said Lisa Pany, a sixth grade teacher at Springhouse. “When your boss tells you what to do, you sometimes have to work with a group of people to get a project done.
“As a teacher, when you’re watching students work together, it’s wonderful to see.”
“The collaborative station focuses on team building in a project-based setting that is supposed to resemble real life work,” said Dellicker.
Melissa Goldstein, a Parkland High math teacher, said teachers have to do a lot of preparation to make sure students have enough to do — and understand what to do — at their independent computer stations.
Goldstein said students really like the independent stations, which is surprising because it’s where they do so much work. “We’re sneaking in work and they don’t realize they’re doing work.”
Dellicker said the computers students use provide teachers with data showing what skills each student is mastering and where some may be struggling.
That helps teachers target where more help is needed.
Some blended learning classrooms use only two rotating stations, rather than three. Some do two on some days, three on others. Teacher-led instruction is part of all of them, of course.
Students participating in the pilot classrooms do not attend only blended learning classes.
Beth Breiner, the district’s educational technology coordinator, said subject areas taught in blended classrooms in the middle schools are sixth grade math, social studies and pre-algebra.
At the high school, some students in blended classrooms are learning algebra I, algebra II, geometry, a.p. statistics, 10th grade American studies and entrepreneurship.
Breiner said all 13 teachers involved in this year’s pilot program enthusiastically volunteered.
Smith said it took a year for Parkland’s blended learning committee to develop a plan, adding that committee consisted of 15 administrators and 17 teachers.
“The union president and vice president also are involved.”
Blended learning goals
Breiner recited the goals of the pilot program:
• To motivate students to learn while they are developing life-long learning habits.
• To improve student academic performance and growth.
• Develop digital age competencies.
• Enhance teacher effectiveness.
• Improve school efficiency.
Dellicker Strategies
Kevin Dellicker said Parkland had done much intensive planning on blended learning before his New Smithville-based company was hired as the consultant.
“We like their model,” said Smith, adding Dellicker Strategies offers the district plenty of assessment and coaching for professional staff development.
In February, Dellicker Strategies and the Hybrid Learning Institute recognized Parkland as the district team that made the most positive impact on students during the first year of hybrid instruction — even though that first year has not yet ended.
That institute comprises 52 schools in Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Ohio working together to advance blended learning. Institute members apparently are all current or former customers of Dellicker Strategies.
Dellicker said his company is working on blended learning programs with 52 schools in 30 districts in three states and assisting 25 more that are planning to begin the programs next year.
He said some of those 52 schools “are all in, whole school implementations” — meaning all their classrooms use some form of blended learning.
He said other local schools are interested in the concept, including Bethlehem Catholic High School.
Dellicker said Allentown’s Central Catholic High School was the first Lehigh Valley school he worked with on the concept. “They did a small pilot beginning in 2012.”
Smith said other school districts, including Quakertown and Palisades, are doing other forms of blended learning without working with the consultant.