Flip to Own

I have been participating in an interesting discussion this week and here is some insight into  Flipped Classrooms

1.     What does that mean to an educator?

Teachers will hopefully be able to move away from lecture which is, as mentioned in Teaching Naked, used primarily for “first exposure” and is usually “poor at delivering content, creating high-level questions, encouraging deep learning, and getting students to re-examine their assumptions (Bowen, 2012, 111-112).

The advantage to a flipped classroom is being able to spend your time as a teacher on what matters most. Students are engaged and motivated by problem-solving, interaction, relevance, and feedback. By flipping classes teachers are able to improve the student experience by focusing on what matters to them.

2.     Does an educator role changes once a flipped classroom is in play?

Typically teachers take the role of expert resource where they take the stage and present their material through explanation. Sure, there are other roles of a teacher, which I teach in a TESOL program based on Jeremy Harmer’s How to Teach English, 2007, like prompter, assessor, controller, guide, etc. However, it is the expert the students pay for and the expert who delivers the content. Flipped classrooms will encourage teachers to facilitate learning through a guided discovery process, rather than present information as if it is the first time students are seeing it.

According to Hamer (2007), teacher as facilitator is someone “who is democratic (where the teacher shares some of the leadership with the students) rather than autocratic (where the teacher is in control of everything that goes on in the classroom), and one who fosters learner autonomy (where students not only learn on their own, but also take responsibility for that learning) through the use of group and pair work and by acting as more of a resource than a transmitter of knowledge (Eton Institute).

It is empowering when both the students and the teacher are responsible for the learning that is taking place and when the teacher is freed for expert responsibilities when, realistically, the internet has replaced them as an expert resource. Students are able to take ownership of their learning.

3.     How do you use it in your line of work or industry?

I have designed a blended learning course for Pathway students using backboard's free version called coursesites.com but I have never had a flipped classroom experience. I hope to plan some flipped lesson plan templates for the college instructors I work with using this checklist to validate flipped lessons and class-activities-and-assessment-for-flipped-classroom

I know that in order to have effective technology integration in the classroom, it is essential that teacher beliefs include a belief in learning new ways of seeing and doing things. Hopefully as I grow to change how I do things, I might be able to inspire change in how the teachers I train and the students hey teach do things as well.

My questions for you are:

If one of the advantages of this approach is that students are able to ‘practice’ and ‘reflect’ with a educator close by, so they are more likely to practice collaboration, creative problem solving and effective communication – skills that are in found in the real-world workplaces, then what kind of tasks ca we plan to benefit from those advantages?