Blended Learning

Our Vision

Leveraging technology, personalizing learning, empowering teachers, accelerating results, elevating our community 

Our Objective

To transform our schools, over the course of the next five years, into blended learning environments

Our Rationale

Our primary purpose for implementing a blended learning approach is to continue to increase student achievement while ensuring our young people are prepared for post-secondary learning and careers as they learn in a 21st Century environment.  Blended learning will revolutionize learning for our students. With technology’s assistance, we can dramatically increase their control over the time, place, path and pace of learning. In doing so, we’re confident we will see far higher rates of engagement and thus, achievement. Students will be positioned to learn more, about more things, to run when they want and walk when they need. And with technology’s assistance, they will receive immediate feedback on what they know and do not know. More than ever, our students will be empowered to accelerate their learning or get the assistance they need.

Blended learning will also better position teachers to do more of what they love: guiding individual student learning. As classroom sizes and demands have increased, teachers have struggled to differentiate their instruction based on the needs of their students. Blended learning will rebalance this equation, allowing teachers to focus on the highest value exchanges with students.

Definition of Blended Learning

Blended learning takes place in a traditional school building and adds the effective use of education technology to transform the learning experience for students.  It combines teacher-led instruction with high- quality digital educational content that is customized to a student’s needs and abilities.  Blended learning is the transformative educational innovation of our time and has the potential to significantly improve K-12 education throughout the country.

Successful Implementation of Blended Learning

We will know that we have arrived at the vision when every single student is working at their own pace and grade-level designations become less relevant.  Individual students start where they left off on their learning progression, and if they so choose, continue working toward advanced studies as they are provided 24/7/365 access to their learning. Students continue learning in traditional brick-and-mortar schools with age-level peers, but maybe learning things far advanced for their age. Technology is leveraged to provide students, parents, and teachers instant feedback to eliminate learning plateaus.  Students are aware of where they are on the road to post-secondary and workforce readiness as they monitor their personal learning dashboards.  When students demonstrate mastery over a unit of study, they will receive acknowledgment of their success much like a student in martial arts moves to the next belt as a symbol of mastery. Their schoolwork will mirror the world of work, in the 21st Century, including collaborating on projects with peers and applying their learning to solve real-world problems.  Teachers will be monitoring student data to target the needs of small groups and individual students.  This will ensure that teacher time is focused on the highest valued interactions with students, increasing each teacher’s sense of efficacy.  This will in turn lead to greater job satisfaction, as teachers are better able to meet the needs of all students.  This rich, blended learning environment will strengthen our student’s personal advantage while strengthening the communities of Greeley and Evans.