What’s New? My love of hyperdocs continues to be steadfast and I don’t expect to ever abandon them. Hyperdocs are a core part of my pedagogy and praxis. I have learned the importance of keeping things simple and focused my hyperdoc work into one simple template. I continue to use and love logbooks for the ways they support community and collaboration as well as support instruction. Currently, I lean heavily into using my syllabus as a handbook so I do not need to explain the big picture goals or regular class procedures and can instead simply hyperlink to the specific place in the syllabus where that information is found. I do continue the essential hyperdoc practice of making the goal of each activity clear to us all. Keeping things simple with my hyperdocs makes teaching and learning easier as well as doing the least harm.
Original: Teaching with HyperDocs (Google docs guiding a learning cycle) continues to bring me joy and support my students’ learning (before and during the pandemic and hopefully long after). This work continues to be a journey and I want to share how one big change this semester has improved both teaching and learning. I also want to provide an update about my use of HyperDoc templates.
My love of HyperDocs began years ago and is well documented in my blog post Teaching With #HyperDocs — which also offers some powerful reasons why you should teach with HyperDocs too. Among those early posts I explain why I love HyperDocs and jumped into using them in my classes soon after learning about them. However, it was the pandemic that pushed me to take my HyperDoc use to the next level with the creation of my own HyperDoc templates designed to support my specific class organization and teaching style. Teaching with HyperDocs has always made me a better teacher, but teaching with my own Hyperdoc templates was a super boost for my teaching powers.
My HyperDoc work in the fall and winter terms helped me improve my system and so far this semester things have been working wonderfully. My first semester using HyperDoc templates did require some work to adapt old teaching plans to fit my new templates. However, I think revisiting and rethinking lessons and plans is always a good idea from time to time. I need to regularly re-examine my praxis to sift and sort what is really useful and practicable from what is merely interesting or fun. However, much of that heavy lifting took place in the fall and now updating HyperDocs is fast and easy. That is a real gift when I am struggling with pandemic malaise.
While HyperDocs worked for many of my students in the fall and winter terms, a few tweaks in my HyperDoc design and rollout at the beginning of the spring semester really improved student experience and positive reviews from students are peppered throughout their reflections. I’ve added course overviews to every doc (see above) with the exception of the activity (lesson) docs so it is easy to see how the work of the week fits within the unit and the work of the unit fits within the scope and sequence of the class. In addition, I made sure that each HyperDoc is connected with the others. My first iteration had a lot of dead-ends which was often annoying and sometimes confusing. However, one big change that supports both this understanding and the work of the class was the introduction of Logbooks.
For much of my work with Hyperdocs I have used various Google docs, slides, sheets, and forms to collect student work along the way. After a lot of experimentation, I have found that I prefer the interaction offered by a simple table set up in a Google doc. Students are able to add their materials to the doc and then use the comment tool to interact with their classmates and their work. However, because I’m clearly a foolish person, those docs had popped up like mushrooms throughout each unit with at least one per week (why would I sometimes have more than one per week – nobody knows). This often complicated things for students and caused me serious headaches. But working with my HyperDoc templates has forced me to think about my classes in new ways and inspired a simple fix that has so many benefits for my students and myself I kick myself every day because I was so slow to implement it.
The logbook serves as both a portfolio for each student but also a studio for the work currently in progress. The column headings for each unit logbook show the progress of our work starting with foundational activities (usually snaps for my general education writing students but vary for my professional writing students) then a workshop draft and concluding with a showcase of their final drafts (because my #ungrading model is focused on process rather than product). Each table cell does more than link to student work, students also share models, tips, and advice, and recognition of when their peers writing exemplifies these lessons. Logbooks are busy and messy with a lot of side conversations, some stalled efforts, and a few dead-ends, but that is exactly what a workshop should look like and I am happy to have found a way to replicate this work asynchronously.
As we wrap up the first unit of the semester, my students have noted in their reflections how much they have learned from and enjoyed seeing the work of their peers unfold. The logbook also offers students the opportunity to update or replace work that they decided (based on either feedback/observation or further reflection) was not suitable. Our logbooks have helped us create a supportive community of writers that is focused on the writing process.
As a teacher I have found the logbooks useful on so many levels. It is easy to see the big picture of each class and the work currently in progress so I know if it is best to nudge classwide or individually. But it is the work with individual students where I have found the logbook especially useful. When looking at the work of the week I have a students’ previous work easily accessible for reference. This also helps me to provide better targeted responses to student questions or reflections. I also love how easy it is to point to other student work or one of our crowd-sourced models as an example. I think the logbooks have also helped students gain confidence in their work as they build on early success and community response to their ideas. The work process supported by the logbooks also seems to encourage trust in the community as it deepens our connections to each other through our ideas and work.
One of the great advantages of HyperDocs is the agency they give students. I have always preferred to teach writing asynchronously because I know each writer has an individual process. HyperDocs allow students to work at their own pace and loop back when necessary without derailing or distracting the rest of the community. Students have control over when and how they work on their writing. The logbooks also offer students agency over their work schedule and focus. I offer students flexible deadlines and there are no firm due dates. However, I also stress that the schedule offered is to help them successfully complete the work and that failure to stay on schedule with the rest of the class means that they cannot support our community and are less likely to receive support in return. The logbook does offer a lot of information that can help students catch up on work, but it also helps students make informed choices about where to focus when doing so.
My HyperDoc templates have made my teaching life easier, support student learning and agency, and help us sustain our community of writers. There are many reasons to love and teach with HyperDocs, what is holding you back from trying them in your classroom?
Image by Markus Distelrath from Pixabay
Hi Deanna!
I love the supportive community aspect of your logbooks as well as their potential for making so much info accessible from one place! I’m intrigued and curious about a couple things, mostly in terms of logistics.
If the columns headers along the top of the logbook identify stages in the writing process, how are the rows set up? Does each student get a row?
Also, how do you gain student buy-in to sharing their work with the rest of the class? Do (m)any opt out and how do they submit their work? Do they add links directly to this doc or do they submit them elsewhere and you add them?
Perhaps I’ve misinterpreted your set up somewhat but hopefully these queries make sense. Thanks for any related response!
Thanks, Jessica, for your enthusiasm about this topic. I must admit I get pretty enthusiastic about logbooks, too. Many students include them in their reflections as tremendously helpful for their writing process. The column headers don’t represent stages in the writing process – at least not in the traditional sense – they just represent the work we are undertaking along the way. The first two columns represent SNAPS that include some writing but the goal here is simply to jumpstart thinking and conversations to help writers choose their focus for the upcoming deliverable. There is usually a third column where students note the values they have identified as important to their work (as a lot of my writing assignments are built around personal values). We use these values to identify intersections and connections among mentor texts and student writing. The fourth column is a very preliminary draft – I hesitate to call it a draft as it is more of a start to a draft and is usually 30-50% of the length it will eventually become. Our workshop focuses on the idea being developed by the essay. The final column is the showcase where students show off their final essays. Students are often quite invested in the work of their peers as they have watched ideas develop over time. Each student gets their own row. I format the column with students names as a subheading so we get a handy outline/directory on the left-hand side.
Opting out isn’t an option. I use an ungrading model and posting/commenting on the logbook is part of the expected work each week. We do all our work in Google docs and they post the links to their work themselves. Of course they do not all post in the expected window and the spread grows as the semester progresses but in some ways the logbook is perfect for that as well as students who are behind with their work are not left completely out of the conversations. While they typically don’t get any feedback they can study the work of their peers. Probably there is not reluctance to post here because our work and feedback is not focused on judgment or grades but enthusiasm for ideas and providing the support the writer requests. I use an inquiry-based approach to the author’s agenda for our workshop.