A Good Flipped Classroom is not about the Videos!
His first point is: It is Still Consumption
I will give him that. The video lessons are recorded lectures, which students must then consume. Even so, it is a more efficient way for students to consume the material. I try to create video lessons that are about 10-15 minutes long. Instead of sitting in class and listening to a 40-50 minute lecture they now go home and watch a more condensed and focused lecture. These lectures are free from student interruptions and tangent conversations.
The video lessons give students more control over the traditional lecture. They can stop the video and go to the bathroom or just take a break. They can rewind something they missed and they can re-watch the video lecture as many times as they want, when they want. For final exams, I told my students I will re-teach any topic you want as many times as you want...just hit the replay button!
Education is about student consuming knowledge. Somehow, someway students must consume information. I am not saying that the videos in of themselves are groundbreaking educational innovation. It is what you can do in the class now that you are free from the lecture that is innovative.
His second point: Teachers are Accountable for Student Learning
This idea of teacher accountable is a debate for an entire post on it's own. But again Derrick misses the point of what you do in a good flipped classroom. He says "How can they (teachers) be held accountable for learning that is supposed to be taking place outside of the classroom?" In a flipped class, the learning does not take place outside the classroom. My students watch the videos to develop background information not to learn. I never expect my students to watch a video at home and come to school the next day knowing the material. If so, I would be out of a job. The idea is they walk in with a general idea of what is going on and have developed questions. I can build on that in the classroom. I have tried to get them to do this by reading the textbook, but you know how that goes. Now, we can do different activities, labs or projects that we didn't have time for because I was too busy lecturing.
My students learn in the class. They ask questions and are more engaged in the material. We have conversations about the material. I am no longer standing at the front of the room dishing out information. I am walking around the class interacting with my students correcting misconceptions, helping them make connections to the material, and just getting to know them. Can this be done in a "traditional" classroom? Yes, but the flipped model makes it easier and gives you more time.
His third point is: Not Every Home Can Support a Flipped Classroom
Yes, I agree. Not every home has internet and some that do have very poor connections and slow computers. There are was around this. There are ways to even out the playing field.
At the beginning of the year, I collected data on how many students have access to the internet. Fortunately for me, all of my students but one had connections. I talked with her after school and gave her some choices, which are listed here:
- I can burn all of my video lessons on a dvd and she could watch them on her TV. Almost everybody has a TV and DVD player.
- I could burn the videos on a flash drive and she could watch them on her computer.
- She could go to the media center during her homeroom time to watch the videos.
- She could just read the material in the book on her own, after all watching the videos is not mandatory.
She ended up telling me that she is a tutor in the Math Resource Center and that she had time to watch them on her phone in between helping students.
While the flipped model seems to be favoring the more fortunate, resourceful teachers and students can find ways around these obstacles.
I know that Derrick says that he loves what the video lessons are doing and that he was not trying to bash...but I just think he missed the point of this flipped revolution. He is right...the video lessons are just a resource and they will not save education alone. It is what you do with the other half of the flipped classroom...it is the in-class portion that will make all the difference.
I am grateful for Derrick's piece because it did what he intended. It shed light on some of the "negative" aspects of the flipped classroom. I hope this article helps to dispel the negative!
Thanks
Dan
