Micro Blend

What is Mircro Learning? 

This week I came across an article published by Grovo on Micro-learning.  Below are the key concepts on Micro-learning

"We are moving from a culture of deep attention to hyper attention"  

The retention of material taught in long courses is not effective and is often forgotten within one year.

However, by creating Micro-learning modules, 

• we are able to retain the information
• work at our own pace
• and interact with the material in holistic approach. 
  

 As a teacher, I am starting to see that if I don't quickly engage my audience and have them working on project, they will start to check their email, Facebook, and/or text their friends.  By providing short burst of knowledge, changing activities every twenty minutes, and make sure the participants are engaged in an activity every eight minutes, I will meet the needs of today's learner.  

What is the 90 20 8 Rule? 

• Keep the lesson to 90 minutes or less
• Change the activity every 20 minutes
• Make sure the learning is interacting with the material every 8 minutes

Are we in Kindergarten?

This type of teaching kind of reminds me of what it was like to be a primary teacher.  When planning a second grade lesson, I had the students 

• moving, 
• interacting, 
• and changing topics every 30 minutes.  

Yes, that meant that I taught a math lesson, reading lesson, and a writing lesson within a 90 minute period of time.  The students would rotate between stations and groups every twenty minutes, and the lessons always contain an activity they were working during the station.  


Are we now suppose to teach all learners like primary students because of lack of ability to hold their attention? 

Blended Learning

In a blended learning lesson we are: 

Creating Change: 

• Students are asked to change activities every 15 to 20 minutes
• Students can have a choice in different modalities while learning
• Students move from one group to another based on ability

Creating Interactions

• With technology, the students have the ability to interact with the content and get instant feedback
• With websites like zaption students are able to watch, interact, and participate in a large group discussion on the topics

Creating Mini Lessons

• Keeping it short- due to having small groups, the lessons that the teachers teach are short and to the point
• The teacher can narrow down on the skill that the students are struggling with and teach that skill until it is mastered
• Ongoing data from Exit Tickets, and Formative assessments can move the students faster through the curriculum. 

Micro Blend

And now, I present to you Micro Blend.  Taking the concepts from Mircolearing and Blended Learning, we can create a learning environment Micro Blend that will 

• Hold the attention of all learners
• Will allow the students to progress at their own pace
• Cut down on amount of planning and creating for the teachers
• Produce greater outcomes on learning objectives

Below is just one example that I will be using in my upcoming training on Blended Learning.  The training will be conducted just like a blended learning classroom and I will be sticking to the 90 20 8 minute rule by rotating the learners through different stations, interacting with material every 8 minutes and making sure we switch learning styles every 90 minutes.