So, I had never heard of a flipped classroom until one of my classmates in EDIT 7500 mentioned it as a potential project idea. I went and looked it up shortly after that and was intrigued. Here is a link to a wikipedia article on the flipped classroom(which is ironic because I would never recommend wikipedia in my classroom) Flipped Teaching.
For those who are not interested in reading the article a flipped classroom involves providing students with video lectures to watch as homework. After watching the videos the students bring questions to class and then do their "homework" assignments in the class with the instructor. Theoretically, the teacher gets more hands-on time with students to develop the application phases of learning.
Coincidentally, I watched the local news at home this weekend that discussed a school doing the flipped class. The science teachers all got together and did video lectures, then did experiments and homework in the class. It seemed very rewarding in the short story.
I am intrigued and wondering how this could possibly be applied to my own breakout sessions. For example, I have to lead one session of life in Nazi Germany. As my specialty is Nazi Germany I could provide A LOT of background information on this topic. I could provide so much background I would likely eat up critical discussion time just prattling on about any number of things. So, I am wondering if I did a brief online lecture with background, what benefits it would have....
Benefits:
1. Give students more background with an intricate topic.
2. Take up less class time with background knowledge
3. Allow students to get more in-depth with reading materials as they will be armed with new background info.
4. Students can have more information with which to debate/discuss the lecture material.
Cons:
1. Does such a video overstep my role as a TA?
2. Does such material contradict the value of the main lectures?
3. Can/should these students be obligated to view this video?
What is encouraging about my initial thoughts on this matter is that all my cons are questions, not definitive negatives. I will just need to ask these questions and if those answers turn out favorably...
I am intrigued by the idea of a flipped breakout section and will be thinking of this idea for quite sometime.
So....I was going to sign off like Doogie Howser does in his blog, but as it turns out Howser never signed off....so....in homage to that cult classic show.....
Lj here.
ReplyDeleteI think that it is super that you are interested in flipped classroom work. The flipped classroom is what I am selecting for my project work. I hope to have this operational by the time I teach the unit. That's a tall order but I believe that I am up to the task!