IALLT Interview Project Episode 6: Interview about the HyFlex Modality with Susan Berry, Luis Deocares, and Shirley Hall

In this interview, Jeff Samuels talks to Shirley Hall (Latin teacher at Ocean Lakes High School in Virginia Beach, Virginia), Susan Berry (ESOL teacher at Center for English Language Orientation Program at Boston University), and Luis Deocares (Spanish teacher at the National Cathedral School in Washington, DC). They discuss courses that they have taught in the HyFlex modality, when students have a mixture of students that are in person and online. Some topics that they discuss include: training and support, tools and equipment, scheduling, ways of making HyFlex and hybrid learning easier for students, adjusting to health guidelines for in-person classes, strategies for interactions between students in the HyFlex classroom, challenges with time, incorporating fun into the HyFlex classroom, transitioning activities from the face-to-face mode to an online environment, the demand for flexibility as the pandemic evolved, giving feedback to students digitally, how students responded to the HyFlex classroom, a sense of community and mutual help among students, screen fatigue, the importance of interaction, technology and communication difficulties, sharing ideas and materials among educators, basing decisions on student needs, how to use our new skills for more inclusive classes in the future, and the emotional well-being of both students and faculty.

Some of the equipment and tools that they talked about were: Jigsaw, Pear Deck, Google slides, omnidirectional mics, iPads, Flipgrid, Blackbaud, Edpuzzle, Padlet, Perusall, Charlala, Jamboards, Wordwall, Breakout.edu, Miro, Parley, Whiteboard.Fi