The Effects of Hybrid Algebra I on Teaching Practices, Classroom Quality, and Adolescent Learning
Intervention description
The intervention uses online resources in face-to-face technology-enhanced classrooms to facilitate the use of algebra I standards-based instructional practices and to improve student learning in grade 9 algebra I classrooms. Each student spends at least 40 percent of class time using online courseware (such as two days a week in a computer lab for a course that meets five days a week or 40 percent of each period when classroom computers are available). As students use the computers, the teacher acts as a coach, assisting individual students or providing mini-lessons to larger groups of students as needed. The use of blended instructional practices is expanding rapidly in Kentucky and nationally. Although the estimated benefits vary widely depending on the by specific interventions examined, Waxman, Lin, and Michko (2003) reported a weighted mean effect size of 0.448 for cognitive outcomes, based on a metaanalysis of 42 studies.
Teachers have access in their classrooms to online instructional resources for direct instruction. Participating teachers engage in sustained professional development focusing on effective algebra I pedagogy and the use of technology to improve instructional practices and student learning. Professional development takes place in blended classrooms as well as online. It begins in the summer and continues through the school year, with monthly online facilitated discussions among participating teachers and two follow-up classroom visits by math instructional specialists.
The professional development is grounded in strategies that research indicates are effective. The program is school based and job embedded, continual and ongoing, content-focused, organized around groups of teachers, designed around active learning, and coherent—that is, the program is aligned with the state education system's goals for content and performance (Desimone et al. 2002; Elmore and Burney 1999; Fullen 2001; Garet et al. 2001; Joyce and Calhoun 1996; Joyce and Showers 1988; Loucks-Horsley et al. 1998; Supovitz, Mayer, and Kahle 2000; Supovitz and Turner 2000).
The Kentucky Department of Education selects and furnishes the online resources for the study through Kentucky Virtual School, which it operates. These resources include algebra I courseware for students, distributed by the National Repository of Online Courses, and professional development courseware developed and distributed by the Southern Regional Education Board. In addition, the Department provides teachers with training to use the online resources in their classrooms and enrolls teachers and students in its courses to access the online course materials. Math instructional specialists from the Collaborative for Teaching and Learning, a Louisville-based professional development provider, facilitate the professional development.