A flipped classroom in action! Wow! I had the fortune of visiting a flipped classroom yesterday in a Halton high school math class. Prior to class, students are asked to watch a math lesson online. The lesson is a YouTube video of the teacher's Smart Board presentation. For an idea of what I'm talking about, see this link. The students do the basic learning at home where they can rewind, pause, or rewatch the lesson as they require. The following day, the lesson is quickly reviewed, and the students get down to practice.
The great benefit is that the students are in class during their practice of the topic; typically, it is during the practice problems where the largest number of questions are likely to arise. The traditional approach, of course, is to teach students the lesson in class and have them work on practice problems at home, where they don't have access to the teacher and their peers for support. Another great benefit is that students will likely approach their homework with a more positive attitude because it consists simply of watching a video! Who wouldn't prefer a video over practice problems? A shortcoming of the flipped classroom that one student shared with me is that it's difficult to know what to take notes on during the video lesson; she misses the note-taking in action that occurs in class. The teacher suggests to her to download the accompanying notes made available to students online along with the video.
I was so impressed with how well the flipped classroom worked. The students arrived having been introduced to the topic, were engaged during the lesson recap, and worked in small groups or individually on the practice exercises. The questions that arose during practice were immediately addressed by either the teacher or peers. I believe that the flipped classroom can be extremely successful in a class of relatively self-motivated individuals. However, those who require more support may find this approach too advanced.
Thank you Mr. Sampson for sharing your classroom with me! It was fantastic to see theory put into action!I was so impressed with how well the flipped classroom worked. The students arrived having been introduced to the topic, were engaged during the lesson recap, and worked in small groups or individually on the practice exercises. The questions that arose during practice were immediately addressed by either the teacher or peers. I believe that the flipped classroom can be extremely successful in a class of relatively self-motivated individuals. However, those who require more support may find this approach too advanced.
Hi Mary-Ann, That is so interesting! I keep hearing about the flipped classroom, but that's so fantastic that you actually got to see one. It seems like a really great idea, especially for a math class, where it's so helpful to have the teacher there as you're working through the problems. I take it that your observation day went really well, then?
ReplyDeleteEm
Hi Mary-Ann,
ReplyDeleteI am so glad that we had the chance to discuss this in class...you sound so excited about the possibilities of this concept. Especially in Math. This would have really helped me as a student. You talk about the different levels of learners and how this approach would work differently. Is it reasonable to have different levels of learners watching different videos? I am not familiar with this grade level. Could the students who did watch and comprehend, then take a shot at teaching it to a "partner" as part of an activity? I don't know if this would work in your environment, just throwing out some thoughts. Thanks for sharing.
I'm going to try to talk my associate teacher into letting me flip the class. I love the idea of students having a familiarity with the material ahead of time so they can bring questions and issues to class instead of having to develop these concerns on the fly. And yes, it's awesome that you got to see this in action ... I'm kinda jealous.
ReplyDeleteGreat post! How did this teacher deal with situations where students could not (access to tech) or did not watch the lesson ahead of time? Did they all have access? I love the idea, and would love to hear more. Thanks so mch for sharing!
ReplyDeleteThanks for the comments everyone!
ReplyDelete@PipeDreams, a partner-share activity is a great idea. What I was worried about specifically was a class in which motivation is a concern. It would be doubly bad for these students, as they would miss the basic instruction and then feel even more lost the following work period.
@Teacher Calder, students who did not have access to tech, or students who hadn't watched the video were given the opportunity to watch it in class; there was a computer dedicated for this purpose, albeit only one.