Remote Teaching Pedagogies: HyperDocs

One of the biggest misconceptions among parents is that their children are only receiving instruction on synchronous days, whether that is in person or on Zoom. They mistakenly believe that their children are "teaching themselves" on asynchronous days. I would love nothing more than to prove them wrong!

Rethink Your Traditional Pedagogy  

Do an audit of your traditional instruction and be judicious in designing for online teaching and learning: 

• cut some content/activities that don't lend themselves to remote learning (lecture, traditional worksheets)
• curate different types of content (memes, video content, other multimedia)
• organize content/activities in a "chunk" of time like a week
• design activities that leverage meaningful instructional technology tools so that students can integrate the content you have curated to create something or collaborate with peers to demonstrate mastery of the content.  

HyperDocs Revisited

If there ever was a time to create HyperDocs lessons, THIS IS IT! HyperDocs enable teachers to transition from delivering teacher-centered instruction to designing student-paced lessons that are flexible enough for students to work on from home and/or in class. This approach is transformational as the role of the teacher shifts to that of a facilitator or coach--from "sage on the stage" to "guide on the side." The role of the student is transformed as well as much more student agency is required, especially when students are learning independently on asynchronous days. If teachers create thoughtfully designed HyperDocs, this transformation can meet with positive results for students.

A basic HyperDocs lesson includes all of the components of a lesson or unit cycle packaged into a single file like a Google Doc or Slide. Teachers curate links to content that they want students to consume and design collaborative and/or independent tasks for students to demonstrate learning. 

• Engage: A "hook"
• Explore: Pre-knowledge
• Explain: Direct instruction
• Apply: Student-centered tasks to demonstrate learning
• Share: Presenting to a wider audience (i.e. peers, public) and getting feedback
• Reflect: Introspection
• Extend: Enrichment or remediation

Check out this article from Jennifer Gonzalez to learn how HyperDocs can transform your teaching.

Last year, I blogged extensively on the use of HyperDocs. To refresh your memory, I "tagged" all of last year's HyperDocs blog posts, which you can now quickly view using the link on the right hand side of my blog under Tagged Posts.  

Feel free to make a copy of this basic HyperDocs template to get started. And check out the HyperDocs website for a deeper dive.