Here are my notes from Session E101 ● To Flip or Not to Flip, That Is the Dilemma!
10:00 a.m. – 10:45 a.m.
Kari Arfstrom, Executive Director, Flipped Learning Network, Washington, D.C.;
Pat Semple, Upper School Librarian, Bullis School, Potomac, Maryland
About this session, from the CIL program: Join this lively session to discuss the new flipped learning model, when flipping a class is appropriate, when it is not, and how to flip a class effectively. Arfstrom and Semple show how school librarians can support their colleagues in this new methodology while also addressing many common misconceptions and concerns about it. Flipped learning is best done with collaborative support, and the school librarian/media expert is a key part to the success!
Kari Arfstrom’s Presentation:
About Flipped Learning
Today, at every level, most students have access to some sort of mobile device. Pedagogy is scrambling to catch up. The flipped classroom or flipped learning is an educator-led movement embraced by thoughtful practitioners looking to make the most of their face-to-face time in the classroom.
There’s a difference between flipped learning and a flipped classroom. When a teacher records a lecture, puts it online, and has students watch the lecture before coming into the classroom, this is a flipped classroom. Blended learning means most learning happens with the teacher, but some of the interaction is online. Flipped learning emphasizes the time students spend with teachers. Flipped learning occurs when direct instruction moves from the group learning classroom to the individual learning space. This is a movement from a teacher-centered classroom to a student-centered learning environment.
Video Is Key
Flipped learning is all about video. Some teachers don’t release videos until the end of the unit so students can prepare for assessment. Some educators ask students to help create or find videos. Videos can also be used as capstone pieces to learning.
If a teacher is recording a direct instruction session, she’s probably showing herself at a whiteboard, or it could be a live capture of her computer desktop, or a headshot, or some mixture of these. Even phys. ed. teachers can use flipped learning. Check out this teacher who uses video to teach his students rules to games before they come to phys. ed. class.
P.S. Buses that shuttle students to the Bullis School in Potomac, MD, have wi-fi connection!
See photos of the Bullis School library here.
Pat Semple’s Presentation:
How School Librarian Semple Uses Flipped Learning
She found she was spending too much time lecture about databases, on the nuts and bolts about how to use the catalog, how to find items in the library. She realized what students needed help with was higher-level issues: Why can’t I use Wikipedia? She has students set up citation software accounts before they come into her classroom. She felt like there wasn’t enough of herself to go around in her 7–12 duties. She used her online presence, her videos, to teach her students the nuts and bolts. When she’s in the classroom now, having implemented flipped learning, she can physically move around the classroom. She uses pathfinders/Web pages (her school uses Haiku but she created her own URL: www.ineedgood.info). Every time she worked with a class she’d create a web page. She created tutorials with screenshots and screencasts, addressing issues like how to use Boolean operators. Since students have already gotten their feet wet before they come into her classroom, they’re able to hit the ground running when they meet together. Students come in with questions already, and she can address them right away. Semple mentioned a secondary benefit to using videos is that parents and classroom teachers can watch her videos.
She uses software like PowerPoint and Camtasia, and tries to work quickly to create and edit these videos. She sometimes adds music. She sometimes adds text. Sometimes there’s no voiceover, sometimes there’s voiceover. (Camtasia provides storage for the videos you’ve created.)
One person in the audience asked about students not doing their video-watching homework. How do we make sure students have all done their homework viewing? What if they haven’t? Arfstrom suggests the teacher would hand a student a device to watch on their own with headphones when they come to class unprepared, so they can catch up.
Since Sepmple started using flipped learning, she’s changed her library’s physical space. She’s weeded books out, put books closer together on shelves, and made room for more tables. Her library now allows drinks and snacks.
For more information on flipped classrooms, check out this article in the most recent issue of School Library Journal.
Follow me at #CILDC on Twitter @MiaBreitkopf.
Image at top from http://teaching-in-the-middle.com/wordpress/index.php/2012/05/17/flipping-blooms-taxonomy/
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