Although many tools, skills, and mindsets from a traditional classroom continue to be useful in a blended classroom, certain other key mindsets are not only useful, but vital. This is why it is so important to shift your mindset first, in order to alleviate some of the initial frustrations that come from shifting your practice before taking an honest look at your mindset

Juliana “The three key mindsets that will be focused on in this course were identified through numerous observations, interviews, and research. These three mindsets allow teachers to approach blended learning with an open mind, ready to try out new things, comfortable with change, and confident with taking on new roles as well as numerous other possibilities.”

—Juliana Finegan, Relay GSE Blended Learning Curriculum Designer

Mindset Summaries

Brain Sketch

Take some time now to hear from teachers and administrators about the three key blended mindsets and why they are so crucial to a blended classroom.

When watching the mindset videos, think about why each mindset is important to blended learning specifically and how you can shift your mindset to better serve your students and strengthen your practice within the blended space.

Flexibility:

The ability to change courses, shift a lesson, or veer in a new direction completely in order address the challenge at hand.

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Innovation (a.k.a-Being innovative):

Being able to look outside of the box and take on challenges with a design thinking mentality

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Role Awareness:

Allowing yourself to take on different roles as a teacher and move beyond the traditional "sage on a stage" structure and mentality in order to allow for student driven learning

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Teacher Reactions:

These quotes were collected from the beta testers of this module. Both quotes are helpful in giving insight into specific challenges and strengths around shifting your mindset.

"I think flexibility is the most important. It is really unsettling to change from a routine that works decently (i.e. whole group instruction) to a new system in whch you will mess up and hit road bumps. The quote from the teacher about giving youself patience as a teacher just as much as you would your students resonated. I think this relates to my biggest challenge. It's convincing teachers that this is a good way to do it even when there will be times when we stumble." - Chicago, Innovation Coach

"I love to be in control and when I am not it's difficult for me to let go, since this is the way I have been teaching for so long. I think this will be the hardest challenge for me when shifting. I am also not very flexible, so I also see this as a challenge as well."- Los Angeles Middle School teacher