KARYN RUIZ: OK, that's set. There we go. So hopefully you should be able to see my screen OK and the correct screen. Are you looking at the correct screen with the sides on it? 

MANDLEE GONZALES: Yes, yes. 

KARYN RUIZ: Awesome. OK, thank you so much. So thank you so much, Diana. And, again, my name is Karyn Ruiz. I'm here on behalf of Aztec as their senior national academic specialist. 

The session that we're going to do today is looking at blended learning instructional strategies and thinking about what that looks like in regards to your classes and your work. I have in the room with me also Mitch Rosin from Aztec. So he'll be covering any additional questions. But please feel free to put questions into the chat pod. And I'll try to answer those if they're pertaining to the entire group or to what we're speaking about. 

So a couple of things to just kind of go over before we get started for today's session. Aztec has a variety of different configurations and programs available. So if there is something that you see in this session that you'd like to learn more about, either a function or a product, if you are an ad tech client, please reach out to your field service rep or to your sales rep. If not, you can certainly reach out to support@aztecsoftware.com, and somebody could assist you with some of those questions as well. 

I wanted also to mention just that Aztec's companies are expanding. Our family is growing. In addition to our Life Skills Education products, and our print-based Steck-Vaughn products, and our Aztec online platform, we now have Aztec's PassAssured program. 

Aztec's PassAssured program is the interactive pharmacy tech program that prepare students for the National Pharmacy Technician Certification Exam. That was just released, I believe, at the beginning of October. I think I got that correct. And we do have another product coming out soon, some other programs. So stay tuned for that information as well. 

So what we're going to do today is we're going to look at what blended learning is. When the pandemic hit, we all kind of jumped into either blended learning or remote learning. And then when we came back, we're kind of doing our own versions of those hybrid blended learning pieces and strategies. 

So we're really going to look at exactly what that is, and what it should look like, and what the components should be. We're next going to look at Aztec's online courses and our printed materials, ePubs, and then we're going to look at some lesson examples and see how all of those could be a part of your blended learning lessons. 

So let's start with a definition of what blended learning is. So if you look here on this slide, this is a quote from blendedlearning.org, which is an online hub of blended learning information and resources created by the Christiansen Institute. And blended learning, as they defined it, is any formal education program in which a student learns at least in part through an online learning with some element of student control over the time that they learn, the place that they learn, the path they use to learn, and also including possibly the pacing of their learning. 

And what we know to be true of our adult students is that they really need to have some control over when they work, how long each work session is, where they work, and at what pace they work. And so this makes blended learning models really ideal for adult students. And there have been studies that have been done to show that blended learning classes may be even more effective for adult learners than just face to face or just online classes. 

So if we break those three components down a little bit further, we can look at them here on this slide. In a true blended learning class, a student is going to have, again, like we mentioned before, some control over their time, their place, the path, and/or the pace in which they learn. And a student's learning needs drive what they're working on and the pace at which they are working. And groups of students may be working on the same activities at the same time and pace but only if these students have completed the previous activities at the same time and pace and have successfully completed those activities all at the same time. 

So when I look at my own students, they do have some control over the time that they work. My students currently right now-- because I'm teaching GED in the evenings. I have class time three days a week, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays from 6:00 until 9:00. 

And for my students, they can choose to work and come into class and work from 6:00 to 9:00 or they can work from home from 6 to 9 or they can work outside of that time. And because I'm utilizing the Aztec system, I can run quick reports and figure out exactly how much they've been working on, and I can enter those times into our attendance monitoring system. Again, they can choose to work from home or they can choose to work at school. 

And they also get a little bit of a choice on the path. So they can choose-- for my GED students, they can choose do I want to do the science first? Do I want to do social studies first, math or language arts? I tend to push my students to try and get them to do language arts first just because if they have lower reading skills, they're going to struggle with the social studies and science as well. I have had in the past-- I think I've taught GED now for five years, I think. 

And in those years, I've had two unicorn students who have said, I totally want to do math first. Math is my favorite thing. And so they have the option to do that first if they like. 

The pacing is also up to those students. I have some students that can just put in 2 hours a day or an hour a week. Or I'm sorry, an hour a day or 6 hours a week. 

But I have other students if they have the ability, and the time and wherewithal to be able to put in more time-- I have a student right now who's doing 20 hours a week. And she's doing 20 hours a week after giving birth like three weeks ago. So she's a rock star. She's got tons of time at home with the new baby. And she's pushing as hard as she can to be able to get finished as quick as possible. 

So they do have some options. In a true blended learning class, that second chevron says that different activities and assignments be they online or paper driven or direct instruction, they need to be all integrated and connected. They do not use tech devices just to include a technology component. Instruction online is not repeated in a face-to-face lesson. 

And so to put that in my classroom sort of examples, if my students are having-- if I've given a lesson in class that's a direct instruction lesson, then whatever they're working on online is also connected to that. So if we're doing a lesson on finding the main idea and the theme, then whatever they're doing on paper, whatever they're doing with a computer also needs to be tied into main idea and theme. 

I have seen a lot of instructors that use like Friday as Aztec time. And so the students are working on Aztec, but they're not working on it connected to any of the other lessons that they've done with their instructor during the week. And so in a true blended learning class, all of their learning experiences are integrated. 

The last piece here is that a blended learning class should include supervised learning. And so in this definition by the Christiansen Institute, it does say that it needs to be supervised brick and mortar, supervised at a brick and mortar location outside or away from the student's home. And so I kind of edited that. And you can see that I put the little brackets there. What we learned through the pandemic is that there are a variety of different ways for us to supervise our students. 

Supervision of student learning doesn't mean I'm walking behind you and looking to see if you're doing stuff. Supervision means I'm following along, and I'm making sure you're working on the right things. And I'm making sure that you're being successful in any of your assessments. 

And so with Aztec, I can do that in a variety of different ways. I can do that with reports from Aztec. I can do that with our monitoring system that's available in there where they provide us with screenshots as a teacher of what the student is working on in that moment. 

I also try to really garner a strong relationship with every single one of my 50 students so that they're texting me back and forth. I'm keeping track of their work through our reports. I'm monitoring their drill or quiz outcomes. And I'm conversing with the students, having conversations with the students about those outcomes. Hey, I noticed that you did six drills yesterday. But every single one of them was at a 20%. We need to have you slow down. 

Hey, I noticed you did two drills yesterday. Both were 90% the very first time. I'm going to open up some more work for you and have you work on that. You're doing a great job. 

That supervision happens with me not next to them, with them not in the classroom, and sometimes it even happens over text and not even through a Zoom meeting. So that supervised learning is definitely available with that Aztec product and not in a physical brick and mortar setting. 

So these are just four of many major models of blended learning. One of them is the rotation model. And you can see by our little orange computer that's the Aztec product. And then the blue are some books, perhaps some of our Steck-Vaughn books. And then the little people-- those are direct instruction. Whatever you use as your rotation model or whatever you use as your components of that rotation model, those components in that rotation model would be fixed. So your students would all do all three of those components in one way or another. 

Another version of that blended learning would be the flex model where there are a variety of different ways for the students to access that learning, and they have choices as to how they would access that learning. And then in doing so, you as a teacher would just monitor and make sure that the student was successful learning those objectives in any way before they move forward. But they wouldn't be required to hit all of those different learning modalities. 

The next one after that would be the a la carte where students could-- we have one main learning module or one main learning modality. And then they would have some supportive materials that they could use if they'd like, if they needed them for mediation or if you as a teacher just said like, hey, this is something I think you should also do even though you've shown success. But this will enhance what you've already learned. 

And then the last one is the enrichment model. And in the enrichment model, there are just a few different learning modalities. And then there's something supplemental that the student could do if they like or if they need to. So an example of that would be I had a student who had never used a computer before. And he was doing very well in his language arts because he was one of my rock star students. He was putting in about 10 hours a day on Aztec. 

And he successfully went through the language arts module in a couple of weeks. But when it came to the essay, he struggled with the essay because he'd never used a computer before. So we had to exit what I typically have the students work on. And I put him on typing.com and had him work through the entire typing lesson units in typing.com. And once he knew how to type successfully, and well, and proficiently, then we could move him back into Aztec, make sure that he understood and was able to pass the essay component and then be successful in passing that GED in that subject area. 

So those are some different models. If you do have any questions about them, feel free to put them in the chat pod or you can raise a hand and come off of mike. But it kind of looks like we're doing OK. Feel free at any time to put any questions into the chat pod or raise a hand. We have a small group. So I'd be happy to answer those questions for you. 

So let's go ahead and move forward then. And, again, I have the chat pod open up on my second screen. So anything you have, just reach out, and I'd be happy to answer it. If we're looking here at our distance learning, we do need to keep in mind our NRS measuring of those proxy hours and recording. 

So the NRS has three different models of measuring distance learning instruction. They're the Clock Time Method, the Learner Mastery Method, and then the Teacher Verification Method. And so this changes by site, by district, and by state. So it is important that you kind of look and see what's appropriate for your site, talk to your site administrators, what's appropriate as your district has it stated, and then also for California as well. 

But with the Clock Time Method, the Clock Time measures time that a student has either worked on their studies or met with an instructor. And so I really like that Aztec has made that easy for me as an instructor because I can just run that time on task report and quickly get that information to import into our attendance monitoring system. For the textbooks, you would need to figure out how much time the student spent on those activities. 

I do have my students sometimes work on some other activities outside of Aztec as additional support. And I, for the most part, just have my students kind of let me know how much time did you spend watching this video or doing this other activity, and then I'll enter that into ASAP is what we use for our time management. So it's kind of up to you. You would want to talk to your program director and your site administrator to see what works best for you in regards to that. 

Learner Mastery is a different version of the NRS proxy hours recording. And so Learner Mastery assigns a specific number of hours to completed lessons. And if a site decided to assign hours of attendance based on completion of Aztec lessons rather than using student's individual learning hours, there is that time on task or student activity detail reports in Aztec. And both of those would assist in figuring out attendance. 

And it really should be noted when you're thinking about doing this if this is an option for your site that there really is no typical amount of time that students finish each activity in Aztec or unit of study. I have some students who in the same lesson that has 50 slides or more they might take 30 minutes, which might seem a little light. They might take an hour and a half. And it just kind of depends on what the student is doing while they're working. 

Some of my students love to take copious amounts of notes. And those students tend to spend more time on an activity than others. Some of them are auditory learners. And with the sound playing, they can really pick it up fairly fast and don't need to stop and take notes. So it doesn't take them as much time. So that really is something that you would want to have a discussion with the folks on your site if that's what you're going to choose to do. 

The Teacher Verification Model-- this would take place if a student using both the Aztec software as well as a textbook like Kaplan like our GED books, like our Steck-Vaughn materials-- if they're using both of those, you would want to figure out, OK, how are we going to give credit for these activities? And in some cases, that credit is actually given for completion for the entirety. And so It would be like if a student passed a GED subject area test, we would give them a bulk number of hours assuming that they would all complete X number of hours in order to pass that test. And so this is just another method. 

Let's move over just a little bit. When we're thinking about setting up a blended learning class, we want to take a lot of things into consideration. And what we've done in the next few slides is we've broken them up into different groups. And so this first group is for our teachers and also really our administrators and our team leaders as well. Because before setting up that blended learning class, we'll need to determine whether or not our staff who is going to be teaching this blended learning class-- are they going to need some additional technology training or other support resources? Are there other things that are going to be needed to make this successful in regards to our instructors being able to lead a blended learning class? 

Those administrators and team leaders will need to decide which content is best for online versus face-to-face instruction and how best to present those lessons that engage learners. Additional considerations will also need to be made for different types of classes, for your single-level classes versus your multi-level classes. We have listed also here how are your teachers going to be communicating with their learners? I know on some sites our teachers are very savvy with using email, and text, and remind, and Google Voice, an all of these different ways to communicate with their students. And other staff members are less inclined to do that and less comfortable with those additional apps and saying email is the only way I'll discuss stuff with the students. 

And for a lot of our students, using email is kind of new to them. And so that really limits that communication. So those decisions need to be made about is there additional training that needs to be made? Are there additional supports that need to be had? And what sort of parameters or policies are we going to set for our teachers that are working in blended learning classes? 

Time is also a consideration in regards to when that student can reach that teacher, when that teacher is available for the student. I currently work in a system, and there's another teacher on my campus that works like this where we tell our students they can text us any time, day or night. We don't care. But they also need to realize that if I don't respond because they're texting me at midnight, that I'll respond as soon as I can, but not to bug me and repeatedly text at midnight. 

So the rule in my class is text me. And if you don't hear from me in 24 hours, text me again. And I will try to reach out to you again in that next 24 hours. Just letting the students know that I have a day job and that I have other things, and my weekends aren't spent glued to my computer waiting for texts to come in. 

But other teachers on our campus are much different. They're like, look, I work from 8 to 3. And when I'm done, I'm done. And then I will get back to them when I get back on campus at 8:00 in the morning the following day or on that Monday. And so those are all things that need to be kind of fleshed out and figured out before that blended learning class gets rolling. 

So it's also important to take your learners into consideration when setting up a blended learning class, things like what devices do they have access to, and do they have access to enough bandwidth to support the programs that are part of their blended class? Academically speaking, how strong are their digital skills? And do you need to help them set up things like an email address that they can regularly access from both a computer and their phone? That's a big issue I have with a lot of my students when they first start. 

They have cell phones, and their emails are set up in their cell phones. But they may have had a kid help them set up that email or somebody at their tech store helped them set up that email when they got their new phone. They don't know how to access their email on a computer. And they don't know what their username and their password are. And so it might mean that for those new users to use an email, you might have to help them set up a new email and then show them how to access it on another digital device outside of their phone. 

Also, you need to take into consideration are these students who are disciplined enough to keep up with working independently, which is a lot of what a blended learning class is? And as a site, what policies are you going to set for making up missed assignments or missed class or how much time on task do they have to do per week in order to stay enrolled in a class? 

When choosing your curriculum for your blended learning class, there are also considerations that need to be made. And it's important to consider what skills would be best taught synchronously, or in person, or even through a Zoom and which skills would be best taught asynchronously, remotely. Teachers might be able to teach some of those technical skills remotely by using things like pre-recorded videos that show students how to first navigate to their Aztec lessons. But a lot of times, those things really need to be taught in person. 

Yesterday, I told a story in one of my sessions about a student who needed to come in 12 times with me to learn how to log on to the site computer that he was borrowing with the hour sites login information, and then be able to navigate to Aztec, and then log in to Aztec with his Aztec credentials. And it took 12 times of his coming in, so six weeks, two times a week of him coming in and me walking him through the steps and making sure he got there in the right place. Sometimes that's what our students need to be able to be successful. And so we need to make sure that our curriculum and our schedules have that set in them and that's easy for them to do. And that's true for other things outside of tech usage. 

It is very hard to teach an essay remotely. And some of those writing skills. It's also a little bit difficult to teach that high advanced kind of geometry and algebra remotely. It can be done. But a lot of times it's easier to do it if it's in person. And so we really need to think about what curriculum is best for that, what strategies are best for that, and is this the right way to teach that lesson? 

So, again, my chat pod is empty. But if you do have any questions, you can go ahead and raise a hand. If not, we'll just keep going OK. We're going to keep going. So let's start looking at our Aztec coursework. 

So this is Aztecs digital continuum of learning specifically for our ABE and our GED students. We have in here our Foundations, Fundamental, and Bridge. That's our pre-GED materials. I have found a lot of success with these materials, particularly for my math students. These materials for math combined with our Steck-Vaughn pre-GED materials really have helped my students navigate their way through that math pathway all the way up to completion of their GED test. 

We also have our GED Kaplan or GED product and our HiSET product as well. Both of those are available as either just our prep solution or as our Kaplan. And what I love about the Kaplan is not only do you get a free Kaplan book with each license, but then there are also videos that teach all of those different key indicators for success at that GED level. We have GED Flash and GED Play. And I will talk about those in just a bit. 

But these are all materials that could be incorporated into those blended learning lessons. And I found a lot of success with them in my classes. They're all aligned to all of the different standards and levelings that you would want them or need them to be leveled to, CASAS, TABE, NRS, CCR, CCSS, our NRS EFL games, everything. You name it, we got it. They're all aligned. 

What's really great too is that our GED is now available 100% in Spanish, both the content and the screen as well. We're working on getting the rest of our ABE content also translated into Spanish, and that will be coming soon. 

So we're going to talk a little bit more about what our system looks like. Once I present that, then we'll look at some lesson examples. But I wanted to make sure for folks who haven't used the system before just that they understand what I'm referring to when we start talking about what it looks like in a blended learning setting. And so all of our products outside of GED Flash and GED Play are set up with Aztec's learning system methodology. And what's really helpful and what I found so important is that they're set up in a way for me to analyze and continually monitor my student's progress. 

So every subject area is broken down into units. Each unit starts with a pre-test. In my class, the pre-test is-- I keep telling my students the pre-test is it shows me what you know. So if they do fairly well in that pre-test, I can see some things that we can skip. Or if that pre-test shows like, no, it's not really a high pre-test score, then I know that we're in the right place. 

Our instructional lessons are next, and each lesson has a drill that corresponds with it. And then following that is our post-test to make sure our students understand that material. So let's look at it this way a little bit so we can see it a little more clearly. 

So this is what our lessons look like on our units if you haven't used our system before. This is our GED math unit or our GED math class. And in here, we're looking at quantitative problem solving in geometry. That's the unit we're going to look at. 

And so when we look at that first pre-test, what I can have the students do-- when they take that pre-test at the beginning, it will tell me like, hey, the student really does understand Pythagorean theorem, geometric properties, solid figures, and composite figures. Or, hey, this is something that your students need to work on. And I really like that that is available for them. 

So the next part is the instruction. And the instruction are those lessons that come down below. And so as I mentioned before, that pre-test will give us that prescription as to whether or not the students me are in the right place or need to move forward. So if our students or if my students go through and those little lessons are waived, have those little blue checkmarks in the front, after they take that pre-test, then I know the student understands that material. 

Now I'm a little bit of a hard nosed stickler in my class. One of my students recently complained to another teacher like, man, Karyn's tough. Because I do make them go back and make sure that they do understand everything. I don't want them just flipping through the lessons and not doing any of the drills. And I don't want them just doing the drills and like, uh, did the drill, and now I'm going to move forward. 

So what I have my students do-- if the lesson is waived, they can skip the lesson. And then they can go in and do the drill. If the drill's at in 80%, then they can just move on to the next lesson that's not waived. If it's not an 80%, I make them go back and do the lesson. 

That's where I was a stickler. I want them to be successful. I want them to really understand this material. Math is a perfect example. If they don't understand the material, they're not going to be successful in future units. 

Also in my class, if a student goes through and does the pre-test and all of the lessons are waived like this with all of the blue little checkmarks, then I just let them skip the entire unit. And we move forward and go on to the next unit. So, again, thinking back to that blended learning, I'm monitoring what my students are doing. I'm reviewing their work. And I'm making sure that they're working at an appropriate pace for them. 

Let's see. This skills practice is referred to as the drill. And so if we look at that chunk of our continuous learning spectrum, you can see that those are all on the right-hand side. I do have my students go back and forth, lesson drill, lesson drill, just to make sure that you understand that one concept before we move to the next concept. 

I mean, you can even see here. You want to make sure they really understand solid figures before we move on to composite figures. And so I think it really is crucial that you are as an instructor monitoring to make sure the students really do understand what's going on. 

And then the last part of that learning methodology are the post-tests. And the post-tests is found at the bottom of the unit. And it is really important, I think, for my students to also score that 80% on that post-test before they move on to the next unit. But if they have scored an 80% on the drill, it's more likely that they're going to score 80% on that post-test. 

And so what I mentioned before and I said I really, really do find success with my ABE students, and my lower-level students, or even my GED students in utilizing the system this way and then being able to pass that GED test quickly after they finished all of this material. By working through it this way, I can ensure that they do, in fact, understand the content or we can pause and go back and revisit right at that content before we move forward. 

And then, additionally, Aztec also has a GED Play and GED Flash materials. And these are materials that I really, really like. GED Flash are like flashcards, I tell the students. And they're broken down in different sets of flashcards. When we were writing these flashcards, I believe the magic number was 6,000. There are 6,000 different questions over all of the four different subject areas. 

I had a student who worked in the flashcards for about three months. And she was studying for math. She wanted to make sure that she really truly could answer every single question that might be thrown at her. And I kept telling her like, well, we worked with GED to write these GED flashcards and flash questions, but they aren't actually the questions you'll find on the test. But they're written like those questions. 

But she wanted to make sure that no question was going to shock her or surprise her. So she worked on the sets for about three months. And she was a hard core working student because she would come to my class when I taught days 8 to 12, Monday through Friday, and then would work a couple of hours in the evenings too. And she said she never saw the same question twice. 

So they really are a great way for your students to practice those questions, not necessarily learn lessons or learn the new concepts, but definitely practice those concepts. And so it's just a really additional great material, support material to utilize. 

And then the GED Play are videos. And those videos similar to the Kaplan videos if you do have the Kaplan version of the GED materials or the HiSET materials. But it's even further than that, expands on those concepts. And so they really do add to those additional concepts that are available for the students to learn. I use GED play a lot also to introduce concepts to my students like, hey, we're going to start learning about composite and solid figures. So I'm going to have you watch a couple of videos about them first. 

[VIDEO PLAYBACK] 

KARYN RUIZ: I'm not sure when I set this up that whether or not I set this so that the sound would play. So I'm going to skip him forward just so you can kind of see what he does. 

- So if you don't know the value of something, you can represent it with a letter. 

KARYN RUIZ: There we go. So you can see in the videos that there's movement. There's expressions. There's a person. There's video that pop up. He's going to guide people through it. 

- And then last term here is simply that same value of x by itself. All right, let's look at another expression. 

KARYN RUIZ: What's really important to me and what really helps me as a learner is I'm a visual learner. And so what I really appreciate about these videos is things are popping up. There's a teacher speaking there. There's different colors. There's highlights. So the student has access to that learning in a variety of different ways and not just through a video. 

[END PLAYBACK] 

KARYN RUIZ: Again, as I mentioned before those videos are on demand. They're, depending on how you set it up with your students, available for them to use to introduce a topic or to refresh or review a topic or to get that information in a different way as remediation. So there really are a number of different ways for that GED Play to be helpful to your students. 

And then GED Flash, again, are those flash sets. And this I thought was really interesting. GED Flash-- when we worked on GED Flash, it was designed in collaboration with the GED testing service. And GED testing service did their own survey and their own study. And what they did is they tested thousands of students. And they noticed that-- they tested the students before they took their GED test. And they tested a student after they took the GED test. And in the interim, those students had completed 10 sets of flashcards. 

And so those flash sets each have 10 questions. And I tell my students it usually takes them about 15 minutes or so to do 10 of those flash sets. And in doing and completing those 10 flash sets, they found that the average student then increased their score on their GED test by 4 points. 

GED had done a previous study and saw that the average non-passing score was a 141. So they shared with us by having students do a minimum of 10 sets of flashcards, that they could actually perhaps get up to that passing score. So that was exciting for us to see that our product was that successful. 

So I'm looking. I don't see any more questions. So, again, if you do have questions, just come on the line for me. 

So let's look at some of our materials. Some of these you may have already seen. These are actually new covers and second editions that are coming out. You may have the other editions, which I had when I was teaching, which had a yellow covers, or blue covers, or purple covers. But this is our GED series of prep materials. 

And so we have a teacher book and a student book. They're also available in Spanish. And this makes us-- Aztec is the only preferred publisher partner for the Spanish GED test. 

And so some of the features that we have in our second edition book are-- it is, of course, aligned to the College and Career Readiness Standards. Our content is reflective of current issues and topics. It is available both in English and Spanish. We do have those lesson quizzes and unit reviews at the end, which are really helpful for my students I found. 

And what we've added are High Impact Indicator lessons for every single subject that were identified by the GED. And then we took those identified High Impact Indicators and created lessons with them. And then, finally, we did also add Contextualized At Work lessons after the end of each unit as well. 

We also have our GED big book as we affectionately call it on campus or in house. And so that does also have formative assessments and summative assessments. And what's really cool about these books and some of our other texts is that they are available as ePubs. 

So they could be individual license for students. And so they could have those on their own devices. We have organizational ePubs, which are available to be able to upload on things like Blackboard or Canvas or Moodle. And then the hubs are also available on our Aztec platform itself. 

So the teacher side would see this. They would be able to add those different books into their library. And then the student would be able to see that book in the library on their Bookshelf tab. 

And so when they open up that book, they would be able to navigate through that book in the contents level. They would be able to put bookmarks in to easily access those lessons, especially for those teachers that are teaching lessons in class. At the end of class, you could tell the students, OK, everybody, get on Aztec. Everybody open up their ePub. Everybody go to lesson 12. And then I want you to bookmark lesson 12, and that's going to be your homework for tonight. So it makes it really easy for the student to then navigate to those pages and activities. 

They can also take notes on the side of the page. They can highlight things. And our pages aren't stagnant like some ePubs. So in the book if there are questions on the pages like they would be in a real book, they can actually answer those questions on the page. 

We also have, of course, our pre-GED materials. And I will tell you that math book is my favorite book on the planet. It has saved me so many times. I've used it for so many of my students. They are coming out with new editions of this and new covers. 

But for now, I mean, this is what I think most people are familiar with seeing. These books also are available in Spanish as well. And both sets do come with those teacher guides. 

And then for our students who are below that pre-GED level, we also have our fundamental skill series, which in house is called fun skills. And those are available for our students who are level 200 and below. They are available for language arts, for reading, and for math. And they do all come with a teacher's edition. I have utilized these books with my students. 

I haven't used the Spanish version. But I did use the English version. And what I appreciate most about these books, because they are for students who are kindergarten level all the way through sixth grade, is that that basic literacy book is to where it starts the beginning level of this series. It starts with letter sounds. And it starts with number recognition. But none of it is primary or written for a child. 

I had a student who did need this series. And he said he was very grateful that there weren't like dancing bunnies or rainbows and unicorns or talking apples or anything like that that obviously this book was made for an adult. And so I really do appreciate this series. And I have used it with my students to some great success. 

So questions about products before we move forward. Anything else? OK. We're so silent. It's all good. So what we're going to do next is we're going to look at a blended learning lesson and what that would look like using these different products. 

And so let's look in here at what my lesson structures are going to have. So for my lessons, I'd like to introduce a concept. And for this, we're going to introduce a concept using Aztec's GED Play, and we use a video. And then for the instruction, I'm actually going to use one of Aztec's lessons on the Aztec platform. 

Then we're going to move on to assessment. And after teaching that lesson utilizing the content on that platform, I'm just going to use the drill that corresponds with it. And that's going to be our assessment. And then the final piece would be our remediation. And so for remediation, I could transfer over and use one of our Paxen pre-GED books. 

And so you can see it's kind of blended. We've done a little in person. We've done a little online. We've done a variety of different things. We're going to jump in and look at it a little bit more closely in just a bit. 

Here's just a reminder. We want to remember that a blended lesson allows for student control and integrated learning experience and supervised learner. We want to remember that our adult students need some flexibility in choosing when they study and with what material they study. And if they struggle with their familiarity with tech, we really want to make sure that their studies will be slowed as they try to learn the content at the same time they're trying to also navigate through the system. 

Because GED exams are only available online and many sites only offer computer-based HiSET testing, it really is important for students to become competent computer users. But that student control component of a blended learning lesson might mean that your students may push aside their tech skills for a little while just to focus on their academic learning. And then once that effective filter of like, oh my gosh, I'm back at school, and I don't know what I'm doing, once that kind of is reduced, then we can kind of add that tech component. 

Remember that whatever is assigned to students should result in an integrated learning experience. Again, that's that middle piece. Never should Aztec be used as a filler activity without guidance or goals. Our adult students learning should be objective based. And if the objective of the student's lesson is identifying the main idea in details, then both their bookwork, and their online work, and their lesson work, their lecture, or what have you, all of that should be focused on that single objective. 

In order to keep a student focused on working on an objective at a time, it will be really important that they are supervised as they work. So this includes assigning specific activities such as you're going to do just lesson 3 in unit 1 and then monitoring to make sure that they're progressing through that material appropriately and that they're successful in that material. 

So the other thing-- this is something that's a big pet peeve of mine. So I think it's really important to do it. So I always kind of put this in as much as I can. I want to pause and just kind of say how important it is to know that your students are actually working on stuff they need to work on. 

For my GED students, I have all of my GED students take a GED practice test. And that GED practice test, if you link the study material to Aztec, or to Steck-Vaughn, or to Kaplan, the material is either online or text based, it'll tell you exactly what that student needs to work on in order to be successful in that test. And so all of my GED students, I have them start with this GED test or GED practice test just to see is this where we need to start? And what do we need to work on? 

I say that with a caveat. For my math students, I actually have a conversation with them first. With math, I don't know what my math students or what my students skills are in math when they come to me because they're coming to me only having taken the reading CASAS test. 

And so I don't know where their math skills are. And I've had a handful of students who scored like a 260 on the CASAS test. And then they don't understand the math at all. And I have them go and take the GED ready practice test for math. And they're like 130. 

So I've started-- because that can be kind of a painful process if they don't understand math and I make them take that GED practice test in math first, what I start is I have a conversation with them. Hey, tell me what you know about percentages. If you go into the store and it says like something is 20% off but something else similar is 30% off, do you know which is a better bargain? Can you figure out what 20% off is? If they can talk through percentages with me, then I'll have them take the GED practice test. 

If they're completely lost in regards to percentages, I'll come in and have them do the Aztec Locator Test for math. And I tried to explain this to my students and also to some staff members recently. The GED-level GED ready practice test is going to test you based on the GED-level materials. 

The Aztec Locator Test is going to test you on the Aztec materials. But those go from kindergarten all the way through 12th grade. And so it really does help for your students who you suspect might be in that pre-GED level to take that Locator Test instead of that GED test. 

And so what's really great about that is that once they finish that test, either the language arts, the math, or the reading, the language arts and the reading I tend to average together or I have them just take the reading. But for the math, same score level, your students will get this little scoring bracket or scoring dial. And then based on that, you can put the student in the appropriate class. So I've had a number of GED students who in math have not tested in the blue high school equivalency level. They're in that Bridge or even that Foundations or Fundamental level. And for my students, the golden rule is wherever you are is where you are, and that's where we're going to start. 

So just by that pre-test, it's really good for your site to be able to have something set in stone to figure out where do my students need to start working? And what do they need to work on? And once they've identified that lesson objective, then they can start with that lesson. 

So, again, as we talked about before with that blended learning lesson, you can have that introduction be a variety of different things. It could be GED Play. Right now on the site that I'm on, I don't have access to GED Play. So that's not an option for me. And I need to ask for GED Play to be purchased so it can be on my site and I can use it again because I really like it. 

But there are other ways that you could introduce that topic. You could introduce the topic with the Aztec lesson. The students could do the Aztec lesson the night before. And then you could have whole class instruction during the day. Or perhaps you could have the students start. 

You could introduce the lesson to the student by having them review the materials in one of the books. This is our pre-GED book. So perhaps they could review it in a pre-GED book. Even though you're going to be working on a GED level, that's totally appropriate. It's kind of up to you as to what would work best for you and your students. 

The next thing that you would want to do is then do that instruction piece. So, again, you could introduce that material in class and say, hey, we're going to start learning about main idea and theme development. Let me give you a little background information. 

And then as the instruction, you could assign to the student the lesson in Aztec, and that could be their lesson for the evening. That could actually even be their homework. Or you could assign the material in the book. Or, of course, your instruction could be in person. Blended learning really is that flexibility piece. It's what works best for your students, what works best for your class as a whole. 

And then, finally, with that assessment, again, you could choose what you would like. You could create your own assessment. You could use the drill from the Aztec platform as your assessment. So the students could do that as an online assessment. Or you could even use the practice materials from the book as that assessment, again, working with your students to determine what works best for you. 

And then after reviewing that information and the feedback from that assessment, now you have the option for remediation. And what's really great about blended learning and having all of these other options is if you don't use one product, you could definitely use another product for that remediation. So perhaps if you had used the book or a lesson directly instructed by the teacher as that instruction, then you could go back perhaps and use the lesson online as the remediation. Let me present it to you in a different way. Why don't you work your way through the remediation here? 

The other thing you could do is you could certainly assign the book material as well. It's entirely up to you and your site, your staff, your students as to what would work best for each student and what would work best for each class. So, again, that remediation-- when we look at it in regards to formative instruction, there are a variety of different things that could be utilized. And so it really is important to keep that into consideration and make sure that you're looking at all of the different options for remediation. There's so many different ways that you could choose to use that material to enhance teaching, to enhance instruction, or to go back and assist students with those concepts. 

So with that, I'm just going to say one more time do we have any questions from the group? I've come to the end of my presentation. Mine was just going to be an hour. Any questions at all? 

OK. So what I'm going to do here is I'm going to put just our contact information here. If you do have any questions, please reach out to us. You can either visit our website. You can also go to support@aztecsoftware.com. I'm not sure if you are aware. But on Mondays at 12 Pacific-- we're all California people. So Mondays at 12, we do have our webinar series that continues. 

We actually did them all through the entire summer as well. I think we just took a couple of days off. So each Monday at 12, we do have webinars. Our webinar coming up is the 30 minutes about our PassAssured program, which we're so excited about for our pharmacy tech program. And so that is this coming Monday. 

And then upcoming in the future, we have a lot about our new series coming out A TUTOR for CASAS. So it's our series to support students in increasing their CASAS scores and its co-partner A TUTOR for TABE. So stay tuned for those. It's easy to get registered for those if you go to our website. 

And then I know that Mandlee has put an evaluation link into the chat pod. So please go ahead and fill that out. If you do have any additional questions, I'll be in here as long as you can or as long as we can. And just thanks, everybody, for staying with us. And have a great rest of your summit. 

MANDLEE GONZALES: Thank you, Karyn. That was a wonderful presentation, lots of useful information. And thank you, everyone, for joining on the last day of CAEP Summit. Please take a moment, provide feedback in the evaluation. 

I did post a link in the chat for this session in addition to the overall session evaluation link for this conference. All right, everyone, I hope everyone has a wonderful day. If no one has any questions, we'll end the session. Have a great day everyone. 

KARYN RUIZ: Bye, everybody. Thank you.