Flipped

Fulton, K. (2012).  Inside the Flipped Classroom.  The Journal.  Retrieved from http://thejournal.com/flipped

Summary

Byron High School in Minnesota has "flipped" its math curriculum.  Students watch lecture videos at home, and work on problems in class with the help of the teacher.  By watching the lecture at home and doing "homework" in class, the students can show the teacher how well they've understood the concepts.  The math teachers at Byron High School did not intend to flip their classes.  They needed to update their textbooks but didn't have the budget to do it.  Since the old textbooks didn't match well with the math standards, the teachers had to get creative.  They decided to develop their own curriculum.

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Originally, they thought they could get all of the material from the internet, but they discovered that it wasn't exactly what they wanted. The teachers worked all summer, using Kuta, a program for generating worksheets and Moodle, a free online learning management system.  On Moodle, each class got a website with lessons, homework, quizzes, and answer sheets.  They also asked the district to allow the use of YouTube.  They created video lessons that were embedded in their websites for students to watch at home.

With the changes, students take more responsibility for their learning.  They work at their own pace. Since they work on problems in class, the teacher is available if they get stuck on anything.  Students who are absent don't fall behind because they can watch the videos, and learn concepts at home.  Parents or grandparents can also watch the lecture video and help their children if there are questions.

Reaction

Flipping the classroom seems like one of the best concepts I've heard about in education lately.  It makes sense to have students get an introduction to a concept at home, and then come to school to dig in and really work on mastery.  Math seems like the most logical subject to "flip", but I think it could work well in other areas of the curriculum too.  For science classes, introduction to a concept at home would increase the understanding for students going into a lab.  Flipping also allows the teacher to get a real understanding of how well students are understanding concepts because they are getting more time to do the work in class.

I see some downsides to flipping classes.  First of all, it requires students to be motivated to watch the lessons outside of class time. If a student doesn't watch, then they come to class totally unprepared and behind the rest of the students, so the teacher would have to spend time catching them up.  Also, not every student has the same access to the internet to watch the videos.  This could make it hard for some students to stay on top of their work, or at least make it harder for them to view the lectures.  Flipping classes isn't a method every teacher or school should implement but in some cases it's an exciting change to learning.