Designing Hybrid Learning Spaces in Higher Education

As Hybrid Learning Spaces move beyond distinctions between online and offlinespaces, they challenge divisions between teacher/student roles, formal/informalcontexts and analogue/digital communication and media. This article presents theconcept of hybridity in higher education through a concrete example of a trans-national hybrid course collaboration between three teachers and thirty students atAarhus University, Denmark and Åbo Akademi University, Finland. The course design isexamined through theories on hybrid pedagogy, learning spaces and media ecology tosuggest five design principles for Hybrid Learning Spaces. The paper argues that high-er education has the potential of inviting students to learn in the world, with the worldand for the world, in a way that cuts across traditional dichotomies and barriers.