Early September I started researching the flipped classroom. Searching feeds, twitter (#flipclass), google alerts and I also read “Flip Your Classroom” so I have been
learning and thinking about this a lot more lately. The posts, tweets, articles I read have different perspectives about flipping a classroom. Posts that look at the positive gains students make. Those that question the pedagogical benefits of having a student simply watch a video to learn content. Posts that discuss contsructivism and instructivism. All of these together makes me ask more questions about what I am trying.
A math classroom using a flipped structure can obviously use more than video as a tool. Geogebra applets, for example, with debriefs could be used . Even video could be made less passive using different tools that question students as they watch the material you create.
But why did I start looking at this?
Initially my goal was to increase the amount of differentiation that was possible in the classroom so I use:
- a blog post summary of the flipped lesson as a way for students to reflect on what they watch or do
- Socrative Teacher based start and exit assessments to see what directions I might need to go in
- understanding checks using Zoho Challenge
- project(s) only one so far based on programming with Scratch that brings ideas and concepts together
As I work though this I think a total reconstruction of my classroom is necessary. Start by looking at what works and what doesn’t. How effective is the differentiation in my classroom. How can I can I increase the levels of differentiation? How can I better inform myself, my students and my parents of where they are at? How can I challenge my students to look at problems from a different perspective.
