The Hybrid Mathematics Class: The best of both worlds, or No Man’s Land?

1. The Hybrid Mathematics Class: The best of both worlds, or No Man’s Land? Mary Hudachek-Buswell Catherine Matos Clayton State University

2. Courses chosen for both instruction formats • Math 1111, College Algebra • Math 1231, Introduction to Statistics • Students are not screened during registration • Students do receive a strenuous communication from instructors regarding the hybrid course format prior to drop/add ending

3. Observations • Focus is on traditional and hybrid instructional formats, and not online instructional format due to lack of data • Online math courses are difficult for most students; hence, screening during registration is required in order to ensure student success • Hybrid format has similar enrollment to traditional format, whereas online sections have minimal enrollment

4. Hybrid vs. Traditional Instruction • Hybrid: In-person contact 75 minutes per week • Balance of work completed online • In-class time spent primarily on working problems • Traditional: In-person contact 150 minutes per week • Both: • Typically 3-4 tests per semester • Comprehensive Common Departmental Final Exam • Homework done online via course management system, CMS (MyMathLab or MathXL) • 1111 quizzes done online via course management system for both formats • Quizzes for 1231 had same content, but hardcopy for traditional and online for hybrid

5. Why offer Hybrid classes? • Limited classroom space on campus • Meets the needs of non-traditional students • May not have the skills for completely online course • Need for reduced on-campus presence • Intermediary step towards online instruction

6. What’s different in the classroom? • Hybrid Math 1111: • Homework is required for each section BEFORE covered in class • Students expected to learn much of material on their own • Classtime targeted to problem areas only • Students asked to write a complete solution to a homework problem and post online for other students • Stresses communication between students • Forces students to use mathematical software, CAS • Additional resources provided by instructor online • Extensive notes for each section in CAS to replace traditional lecture, more examples worked out • Instructional videos via CMS • Create study groups based similar parameters of students • Virtual office hours every morning

7. What’s different in the classroom? • Hybrid Math 1231: • Outlines required for each chapter BEFORE covered in class • Students expected to learn much of material on their own • Classtime targeted to problem areas only • Online discussions for students to solve problems • Straightforward problems • Questions to probe more in-depth issues such as • When to use which hypotheses test • When mean vs. median is appropriate • In-class activities modified to be done online in group discussion format using Java applets • Additional resources provided by instructor online • Extended Powerpoints to replace traditional lecture, more examples worked out • Online Chatrooms available for students to help each other • Virtual office hours • 1-2 tests taken in online format

8. Student Reactions • Students tend to not believe instructor when warned about need for self instruction • See Hybrid as a class requiring half the work. • About half the class thrives in the environment • Those willing to seek help and use resources • Instructor resources (chat, email, office hours) • Tutoring center • Online resources • Many comment at end of semester that they wish they had listened to warnings and taken traditional format.

9. Pros and Cons • Pros: • Reduced need for student travel to campus • Run 2 classes in space for 1 • More flexibility for instructor’s time • Flexibility for completion of homework, quizzes and online tests • Less self-instruction/self-learning needed than completely online format • Accessible to more students than online format • Cons: • Need for students to begin learning concepts on their own • Much more work for instructor to provide additional resources and activities needed to replace lecture time. • “Borderline” students typically do worse.

10. Student Performance: Withdrawals • Withdrawal rates • Intro Stats: Comparable • Traditional Average 17.6% • Hybrid Average 19.8% • College Algebra: Difference • Traditional Average 6.9% • Hybrid Average 16.5%

11. Student Performance: DWF • DWF rates • Intro Stats: ~7% difference • Traditional Average 37.9% • Hybrid Average 45.1% • College Algebra: ~10% difference • Traditional Average 28.7% • Hybrid Average 39.2% • Presenters feel that borderline ‘C’ students account for the differences in the DWF rates

12. Student performance: GPA • Math 1111: Aggregate Data • 3 Hybrid sections (n= 66) • 9 Traditional sections (n=246) • No significant difference in means • Similar results by semester

13. Student Performance: GPA • Math 1231: Aggregate data • 2 hybrid sections (n=53) • 4 traditional sections (n=114) • No significant difference in mean grade points • Less variability in traditional format • Similar results by semester.

14. Student Performance: Histograms • Math 1111 • Percents given • Near uniform distribution for hybrid

15. Student Performance: Histograms • Math 1231 • Percents given • Near uniform distribution for hybrid

16. Student Performance: Final Exam • Means nearly the same • Hybrid Median 7% higher

17. Conclusions • No significant differences seen between mean GPAs • Final exam score show no significant difference in mean either • Histograms show that “borderline” students fare worse in Hybrid format by histograms changing from skewed to uniform

18. Questions?

19. Contact information: • mhudachek-buswell@clayton.edu • cmatos@clayton.edu