Challenging Assumptions: A Post Flipcon15 Reflection

John Armato // Flickr

The last few years of teaching has forced me to challenge normal assumptions about teaching and learning. I’ve done a great deal to test these assumptions, whether through my work on flipped learning and standards based grading. This year’s FlipCon showed me that there is still much work to be done.

The great Paul Andersen of Bozeman Science gave a wonderful keynote and workshop on the first day. I must digress for an interesting observation; Paul Andersen’s Blended Learning Cycles are similar to my Mastery Learning Cycles. At first, I thought I may have unconsciously borrowed from something I read or watched about his course. But I soon realized that we had similar inspiration. We were both inspired by the mastery flip class movement, as well as Ramsey Musallam’s criticism of mastery. Ramsey, another flipped educators, argued that inquiry should play a large role in science instruction; therefore, exploration should happen before direct instruction from video - hence the creation of flipped learning cycles. A second similarity between our models is the mandated small group or one-on-one discussions with students after the first year of experimenting with our flipped learning cycles. Both Paul and I experienced a disconnect from the learning of our students when we incorporated asynchronous learning in our respective courses. We both saw the need to fix our courses by putting us back into our courses. 

This is where Paul’s insights have helped me going forward. He advocated the use of design thinking in education. He bluntly, and correctly, argued that teachers need to accept responsibility for fixing issues in our courses. If the class is not working, it is most likely the teacher who is the issue. Just as Paul and I identified and responded to a major issue after year one of our flipped learning cycle, teachers need to redesign their courses to address problems. Whenever something is not working in my course in the future, I will remember Paul’ challenge to use design thinking to fix it.

Kate Baker and Lindsay Cole led an engaging discussion about grading practices during their presentation. It dovetailed with my presentation with Amanda Meyer about standard based grading. Both sessions touched on assumptions about grading practices. I was pleased to see that there is an appetite in the flipped learning community to rethink what we grade, how we grade and the purpose of grading. In the polls conducted by Lindsay and Kate, a majority of the teachers were in favor of flexible due dates and allowing students to redo work. Even though I consider myself progressive about grading, I am still trying to figure out how to discourage students from taking advantage of my willingness to make accommodations. Specifically, Aaron Sams raised the question of making students feel the sting of procrastination without contaminating the grade, which should reflect learning.

The final workshop I attended was also led by Lindsay Cole. She discussed the use of student generated content. She advocated letting students teach other students through the creation of content. Lindsay made an important distinction between student projects and content. Projects typically cover content already covered and are typically made for the benefit of the teacher to evaluate the learning. On the other hand, student generated content is generated for the purpose of teaching other classmates. Of course, projects are typically shared with classmates during presentations but student generated content is intended to actually teach or cover the content of the course. This topic is of great interest to me. Some of my students who strive for level 4 on some learning targets create similar projects that I use for remediation for other students. Lindsay’s presentation showed me that I haven’t pushed the envelope enough. Rather than relegating the student mastery artifacts to the remediation library, these projects can be the main vehicle for teaching the content. I do wonder if students, especially middle school ones, will be able to internalize the content while creating the projects and whether the audience will effectively learn the content. The final obstacle is Lindsay's structure seems more consistent with synchronous rather than asynchronous courses. However, I am encouraged by Paul Andersen’s challenge, I’ll have to redesign the course such that student generated content is a viable option - moving to synchronous learning for certain units and having student groups initially learn from learning cycles before teaching to other students are ideas that come to mind.

Art of Teaching Lecture

I had the distinct privilege of being honored along with two other colleagues with the Art of Teaching Award. As part of this wonderful distinction, we presented a summary of the work we do with students at an evening lecture at our school. A summary of the evening can be found on the school website and the slides from my portion of the lecture are below along with pictures. 

During my portion of the lecture, I tried to convey how offloading direct instruction to video has ironically allowed for greater personalization. When I began this journey, I wouldn't have anticipated the opportunity to offer this level of personalization. I have been experimenting with allowing students to work at their own pace and the freedom to make choices about what they learn and how to show they have learned the material. I continue to attempt to maximize the extent at which I can differentiate and plan to offer more choice in content and demonstration of learning.

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Google Add-ons and Formulas

During this year's Teaching with Technology conference , I presented about some nifty Add-ons and other enhancements to Google forms and sheets. Even though I no longer use these tools because our school shifted to a new LMS that can do many of the functions, I wanted to spread the word. These scripts saved me so much time last year, below is a copy of the presentation.

Beyond Flipclass - a Post Back to School Night Reflection

A couple of weeks ago, I presented the curriculum to parents at Back to School Night (presentation, here.) While many of the components of my presentation were similar to last year, one major difference stood out: I rarely mentioned the term "flipped class." I still operate a flipped class but it has become a footnote amongst all of the other things I do in my class. Flipped learning, while still a structural element in my course, is no longer the focus- it is merely a tool or means to an end. 

I recall Ramsey Musallam (@ramusallam) explaining that flipped learning is not a pedagogy and Jon Bergmann (@jonbergmann) saying that flipped learning is not all about the videos. While these statements were intuitive, I am only learning their true meaning now. Using flipped videos should not be something to boost about because it really is just a way to present content. While using flipped videos is an improvement above synchronous lectures, they are still basically lectures. However, using flipped videos does make class time available to do the things a teacher may want to do. For me, flipped learning is a way to differentiate the pace of the course. Students can learn concepts at their own pace, revisit and redo work, get help from peers and/or the teacher - all during class time. Students can now provide evidence of their learning in a standards based format. Students have more time to design and redesign experiments, collect and re-collect data, as well as analyze data while I'm present to help troubleshoot. Students can choose how to demonstrate mastery of content, "white board" explanations and decide when and how often to take quizzes. They can decide to what extent to complete specific activities and assignments. In short, I've found my way to move along the teacher vs student centered continuum.

The videos that students watch are merely a resource - they present content and explain lab instructions. They are just a vehicle to move toward a more student centered classroom. Just as a person wouldn't spend too much time explaining the type of airplane used to go on a honeymoon to Hawaii, I didn't feel the need to explain the specifics of the flipped videos used to open class time for more student engagement and ownership of learning. 

Introducing Mastery Learning Cycles to the World: a post FlipCon14 presentation reflection

I had the privilege to present at FlipCon14 about Mastery Learning Cycles (MLC.) I originally discussed MLC in a blog post last year, where I described it as a "mashup" of Mastery learning and Explore-Flip-Apply (EFA) models. In my mind, this hybrid solves the problem of allowing students to learn at their own pace and still promoting thoughtful inquiry through structured learning cycles, rather than a checklist of activities to plow through. The packed classroom and dozens of virtual attendees who watched the live presentation online probably affirm other teachers have interest in mastery and/or EFA (session notes.)

The Flipped Learning Network "flipped" the conference, which meant I had to assign pre-work. Since most veteran flipped teachers are familiar with mastery learning, I assigned a blog post about EFA written by Ramsey Musallam (@ramusallam) and asked teachers to create a learning cycle. The plan was to spend some time during the presentation to front-load this model and the rest of the session having teachers share their cycles. Even though lack of homework completion prevented execution of this plan, I was able to offer a resource for those who wanted to extend their learning after the session. 

The feedback in person and on twitter were positive - perhaps even more so than I expected. I think I did a nice job engaging the audience at the beginning with a karate belt tying activity that demonstrated the power of flipped learning and mastery learning. 

Tweeted by +TheAlgebros 

I also had some opportunities for teachers to talk to each other with discussion prompts. My slides were clear, text-light but image-heavy and did a good job outlining the strengths and limitations of the mastery and EFA models. It may have taken too much time to get through EFA and mastery but the front loading helped outline the strengths of MLC. Perhaps the strongest part of the presentation was sharing my particular learning cycles with student work. I spoke in detail about the simple inheritance MLC by demonstrating how each activity offered a rich learning experience for students. I also talked briefly about the evolution learning cycle just to demonstrate some variation, like labs at the beginning during the Explore phase and differentiation during the Apply phase. 

If I do the presentation again, I'll hope to have some examples of MLC in different disciplines and utilize more opportunities for interaction like polls and more frequent turn & talk prompts. I'll make sure to repeat comments and questions from the live audience for the virtual attendees. I also need to remember to share the link to the feedback form. 

Now that the presentation is over, I have the summer to revise some of my MLCs and look forward to other teachers adopting and sharing their MLCs. 

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Teaching Screencasting Through Flipped Learning Cycles: a post Camtasia Workshop Reflection

Camtasia Studio 7.0.1 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

A colleague and I led a workshop on Screencasting through Camtasia. The premise of our workshop was to organize the full day workshop in a 5E Learning Cycle of Engage, Explore, Explain, Elaborate and Evaluate.

Engage: 
The purpose of this first segment was to generate interest in screen casting and demonstrate why participants should want to learn to use Camtasia. I handed out my son's karate belts and demonstrated how to tie them and asked participants to do the same. Immediately, the limitations of live direct instruction were obvious - different participants got lost at different spots. This introductory activity led to a nice discussion of how videos can be helpful when teaching concepts. Participants understood that sharing a video showing how to tie a karate belt would have been more helpful because participants would've been able to rewind, pause and rewatch at their own pace. 

Explore: 
The next phase demonstrated what can be done in screen casts and identify best practices for screen casting. I shared one of my first (and flawed) Camtasia screen casts with the group and tasked them to provide feedback (eg regarding clarity, color scheme and sound quality.) Participants submitted feedback and questions via a Google form and we used those responses to brainstorm a list of best practices, which included the need for contrast between text and background, keeping videos short and asking questions throughout the video, to name a few. We also briefly touched on some crucial pedagogical issues: how videos are part of a larger learning cycle, why you should avoid spending too much time perfecting the videos, the limitations of recorded lectures, etc.

Explain:
The Explain phase included direct instruction where we led a quick orientation and walk-through of Camtasia. Participants followed us in real time to record a short screen cast with the webcam enabled.

Elaborate:
The bulk of the workshop was the elaboration (or application) phase, where participants worked at their own pace to edit and/or create videos. We shared a Zip folder with editable Camtasia files, which all had a flaw that could be corrected with a specific skill, like trimming, annotations, zooming, etc. We shared a document outlining the task for each video along with a link to the TechSmith tutorial demonstrating that particular important skill. In addition, we also shared the link to the entire TechSmith library of tutorial videos.

Participants spent four hours spread out in different rooms working through the guided assignment and/or creating their own videos. 

Evaluate:  
We provided access to a Google Drive folder for participants to upload their videos or provide links in a Google document of their videos hosted elsewhere. We spent the last hour of the workshop showing the videos created by participants. We all commented on the videos and ended the session with final thoughts and participants provided feedback about the workshop via a Google Form.

Final thoughts: The feedback was unanimously and overwhelmingly positive! Participants appreciated how we framed the activities through a learning cycle and used screencasts to teach screencast creation. The powerful thing about our decision to use videos was that it allowed for participants to work at their own pace and to select what they wanted to learn, which only reinforced the strengths of screencasting in education. We've all been in technology workshops where the presenter elected to run a synchronous live tutorial: the advanced participants get frustrated waiting for the novice stragglers to catch up; and of course the moments when the presenter pauses to troubleshoot for the one or two folks with tech related problems. Leading the workshop only strengthened my resolve to continue developing my flipped course with elements of asynchronous learning and content organized into learning cycles. Hopefully, some of the participants were convinced by their experience in our workshop that flipped learning and screencasts can add wonderful elements to their courses.

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Applying #Flipclass to Conference Presentations: a Post #TWT14 Reflection

As I finalized my presentation for the Teaching with Technology Conference about flipped learning, previous whispers of doubt started to scream too loudly to ignore. "You are planning to do exactly what you hate about professional development." I'm embarrassed to admit I almost took the easy way out:  a traditional lecture on a nontraditional teaching practice consisting of slides of me yammering about my flipped class, without applying the lessons that I learned from #flipclass. 

Despite the wonderful things I learned at FlipCon13, I wondered why the conference wasn't flipped. I remember asking Jon Bergman and he admitted this was a common question. Fast forward almost one year, I proudly receive an email reminding me to finalize the flipped assignment that accompany my presentation during FlipCon14. Surely, the best way to learn about flipped learning is to experience flipped learning. 

Lodge McCammon gave a wonderful keynote address about flipped learning. He covered most of the same introductory ideas I planned to present at the Teaching with Technology Conference. The video of Lodge presenting in front of a live audience caught my eye. I quickly realized that the entire presentation wasn't a video playing in front of an audience, rather Lodge ingeniously decided to prerecord direct instruction about flipped learning and used the rest of the live presentation to interact with the audience. Between these flipped videos, Lodge used pair-sharing, collaboration, invited audience members to create videos that summarized their group discussion and even reflect on their videos. Lodge applied what he learned from flipclass to his presentation. Direct instruction, which could have taken an hour to present live, was condensed to just a few minutes in video format. The retrieved time was reallocated to interactive activities that transformed the typical zombie audience into critical thinkers, consumers into producers and passive watchers to active participants. 

After viewing Lodge's keynote "presentation", I was unable to follow through with my initial plan in good conscious. I reworked my presentation. I recorded separate videos outlining the key ideas I wanted to convey. Between these videos, I engaged the audience in critical thinking, experience elements of flipped learning and reflect on their learning. Because of this offloading of direct instruction to condensed videos, teachers were able to identify benefits of flipped learning, predict obstacles, offer solutions and ask and answer questions. I also picked up some nuggets of wisdom. In fact, more than half of my presentation were teachers discussing ideas. The most important benefit was the audience experienced how a flipped class could transform a class.

While I'm happy that this was more of a discussion than a presentation, there are a few things I would change so far:

1. A few timing quarks - the last video went through some important content a bit fast. I wish I'd stress the links on the introductory slide a bit more and gave some time for folks to copy the link to the presentation and session notes. I also let an early discussion take more time than I should have. This eliminated the feedback time at the end.  
2. Format - I could've changed the format of each pair-share and discussion. Varying the engagement activities could have displayed more innovative uses of a flipped class.
3. Practicality - I wonder if my session was too theoretical rather than practical. I mentioned some tools and briefly why/how I used them. This session was more about making the case for flipped learning and sharing models above the limited media definition of flipped learning. (I suppose the title was consistent with my workshop.) 

Despite some of the possible tweaks, I'm grateful that I stumbled on Lodge's video, he reminded me to be true to myself. Thank you! 

Interview about Asynchronous Learning and Standards Based Grading

Yagraph // Wikipedia

I had the privilege of chatting with Jonathan Bergmann on his radio show, The Flipside on the Bam Radio Network. Primarily we talked about my journey to flipped instruction and standards based grading. The interview is linked here. 

Aside from my nagging habit of saying "direct instructional days" rather than "direct instruction days," I thought the interview ran smoothly. I also see why Jon was an award winning educator; even as an interviewer, he was captivating, reminding me of his keynote address at FlipCon13. 

The messages I hope were conveyed during this interview:

1. Flipped learning saves class time and creates more opportunities for greater engagement and individualized learning.
2. Asynchronous learning allows for differentiation.
3. It's possible to adopt aspects of flipped instruction and it is also possible to successfully adopt flipped instruction (and mastery learning) wholesale, without a long period of transition.
4. Middle school students can thrive in a flipped class.
5. The assessment based system of grading is broken because it can hide what students truly do and do not understand.
6. Standards based grading is the solution to the broken assessment based grading system. 

A Busy Week as a Flip Class Ambassador

This week has been a busy one as a flip class ambassador. I found out that my proposal for FlipCon 14 was accepted. I am presenting on a model I call Mastery Learning Cycles. In a previous post, I explain that the model is a hybrid of mastery learning and Explore-Flip-Apply. 

On Thursday,  I intended to present at the NYSAIS Teaching with Technology conference about various models of flipped learning and the evolution of my understanding of flipped learning. Unfortunately it was cancelled due to inclement weather. There are plans to reschedule in June. 

Next week, I'm leading a workshop at my school's Professional Development Day. Before the new Academic Dean took over, I suggested a day of teacher led workshops and I'm happy to lead one those workshops on flip class. The presentation is actually about Google Forms and scripts, which have been invaluable in managing workflow in my asynchronous flipped class. 

I will continue to look for opportunities to share my experiences with the flipped class. It is a powerful vehicle that can help students and teachers. 

Teaching with Technology Conference Presentation

As I am waiting for word about a possible snow day tomorrow, I feel some despair. Instead of missing school, I will miss my presentation at the NYSAIS Teaching with Technology Conference. Even if I am unable to present, I've included my Google presentation below.