A time‐based blended learning model

TLDR

The paper aims to outline a time‑based blended learning strategy that frames learning opportunities in synchronous and asynchronous modalities, proposing a model where physical teaching environments are replaced by time. The authors deconstruct blended learning components to identify digital‑technology‑driven changes, illustrating course design and delivery by framing learning opportunities in synchronous and asynchronous modalities and proposing a time‑centric model. The study finds that time‑based blended learning, historically linked to early asynchronous printed materials, emerges when time is the primary organizing construct, yielding five components—migration, support, location, learner empowerment, and flow—while modern technologies free learning from classroom constraints, emphasizing learning over teaching and positioning time and synchronicity as primary elements.

Abstract

Purpose This paper seeks to outline a time‐based strategy for blended learning that illustrates course design and delivery by framing students' learning opportunities in synchronous and asynchronous modalities. Design/methodology/approach This paper deconstructs the evolving components of blended learning in order to identify changes induced by digital technologies for enhancing teaching and learning environments. Findings This paper hypothesizes that blended learning may be traced back to early medieval times when printed material provided the first asynchronous learning opportunities. However, the digitalization of contemporary learning environments results in a de‐emphasis on teaching and learning spaces. When time becomes the primary organizing construct for education in a technology‐supported environment, blending possibilities emerge around five components: migration, support, location, learner empowerment, and flow. Research limitations/implications This study enables the readers to conceptualize blended learning as a combination of modern media, communication modes, times and places in a new kind of learning synthesis in place of traditional classrooms and technology with the teacher serving as a facilitator of a collective learning process. Practical implications The major implication of this paper is that modern learning technologies have freed students and educators from the lock in of classroom space as being the primary component of blended learning, thereby emphasizing learning rather than teaching in the planning process. Originality/value This paper proposes a new model of blended learning in which physical teaching environments give way to time. Time and synchronicity become the primary elements of the learning environments. In addition, the authors suggest that the time‐based model as an educational “new normal” results in technologies as enablers rather than disruptors of learning continuity.