Monday 6 February 2012

Flipping classrooms - why and why it has to be the teacher that does it

The Flipped Classroom idea - where the presentation is videoed by the teacher and seen by the student for homework prior to the lesson, and the actual lesson is used to provide one-on-one and one-on-several help - seems to have real merit. Traditional approaches make differentiation difficult but flipping could allow the student to self-differentiate at the presentation stage. Since the student has control over viewing the video, s/he can self-pace.
Later, in the classroom, the time can be spent working through and applying, with peer support and teacher facilitation.
This is still new. There is little research on it. I wonder how flipping all classes will look like from the point of view of the student - particularly those who cannot access this learning in this way and need much more support/scaffolding than the videoed presentation.
Katie Gimbar has two videos which put the case for flipping well - the first is why she flipped her classroom and the second why it has to be her (and not Khan Academy or other OER). #change11