A Problem-Centered Approach to Designing Blended Courses: Unifying Online and Face-to-Face Modalities

After experimenting with emergency remote teaching during the COVID-19 pandemic, K-12 schools have retained select online instruction by incorporating blended teaching models. In response, teacher education must respond in innovative ways to prepare future educators with blended teaching competencies. This article presents a problem-centered model for designing flipped courses and discusses how this can demonstrate blended teaching practices that pre-service teachers can observe and experience. Applying a descriptive phenomenological research design, the author iteratively prompted 12 pre-service teachers to reflect on their experiences in a flipped, technology integration course, designed according to this problem-centered model. The results indicate that pre-service teachers experienced the online space as a place to experiment with novel technologies; the in-person class as time for practicing challenging skills and reflecting on future possibilities; and the problem-centered nature of the course as a unifying element and scaffold for their learning.