Hybrid schools?

My principal just dropped of a recent copy of the Harvard Education Letter and he drew my attention to the article suggesting hybrid schools are useful for the "iGeneration."

My response was, "yeah, sure, but the advantages are even greater for the iGneration's teachers." We are all familiar with the productivity paradox of computers... we purchase (or upgrade) a computer (or software) because it promises to increase our productivity. The reality, however, is the opposite happens; our productivity is not improved, and if we factor in the time needed to learn how to use the new technology, our productivity is decreased.

A hybrid classroom, however, will allow us to improve our "productivity" (I use quotes here because productivity is a meaningless concept for educators' work) by using the online site to manage those parts of education that can be well-managed via a computer.

Need to know the missing homework? "Go look on the course site."-- Because I post the assignments there and the site does a better job remembering what the details were and when I gave it than I do.

Need to see which questions you got wrong on the quiz in the parts of the microscope? "Go look on the course site."-- Because the computer can compare your answers to the ones I expect far better than I can and I want to make sure we know this "stuff" quickly before we move on to the good stuff of looking at cells.

Need a review of the parts of the microscope? "Go look on the course site."-- Because there is a good video that reviews the important points and the video never gets sick of pointing to the microscope and naming points like I do.

So, my point is that computers are far better at performing certain tasks than I am, and a hybrid classroom is one way I can use computers for what they do best and save our time together as a class for more interesting topics.