A Pleasant Surprise Courtesy of Asynchronous Learning

I have a student who has struggled in my course this year. I'll refer to him as Donald. Donald hasn't quite internalized the demands of the course; specifically, he falls behind and doesn't use homework time to catch up. Donald definitely has struggled with the personal responsibility needed to be successful in my course.

This may have changed! I was pleasantly surprised during this spring break - a much appreciated #eduwin. Donald spent some of his spring break working on the next unit. So far, Donald has taken notes on two videos and completed an entire POGIL. Had this been a different student, I would be worried about spending vacation time doing school work but this is a good move for him. Donald will start the next unit a week ahead of his peers. Not only will this give him a cushion and provide great momentum at the beginning of the final quarter, but I suspect this will also be a psychological boost. I think he'll feel great about being ahead when all year he has been behind. 

Even though I expected some of the exceptional students to work ahead of peers, I didn't foresee this possibility. I use this mastery model to allow students to work at their normal pace but I never intended for a struggling student to use vacation time to move ahead. If Donald has a successful final quarter, I'm quite sure it will be because he took the initiative and took advantage of the opportunity afforded by the asynchronous flipped class model. 

On Being Less & More Helpful

Recently, I read a blog post from an educator who argued that teachers ought to be less helpful, in order to be more helpful. The argument goes as follows: teachers who over scaffold ruin the opportunity for students to engage in critical thinking and problem solving. Math educator, Dan Meyer cited some wonderful examples in his Ted Talk, "Math Class Needs a Makeover." It's easy to see this issue in math education, especially with word problems. A word problem might ask the volume of an object. In an attempt to scaffold, the problem might list sub questions which identify the major requirements to solve the overall problem. This might be over-scaffolding because an important part of problem solving is identifying the required information and ignoring the irrelevant information. The sub questions substitute for this process of critical thinking. The result is mindless calculations, where students might be able to solve the overall problem but not understand why the solution works. In this case, by being overly helpful, we stunted the intellectual development of our students. What if we just erased the sub questions? It would drastically increase the rigor of the problem. Students would have to think through which information is important and why. They would have to develop a strategy and figure which steps to complete. 

In the real world, when we need to solve problems, there are no clear steps dictated to us. We are the arbitrators of relevant versus irrelevant information. We decide which steps we need to take. Our classes should mirror reality in this case. 

I've been motivated to be less helpful this year. For example, I use to provide experiment-specific guidelines for each lab report. My hints document would tell students which graphs to make, which research to conduct in the background and which statistics to calculate. I no longer provide such a document. My students have to decide which data to graph and what type of graph to make. They have to figure out which topics they should research. Even though I still dictate which statistics to calculate, overall I have achieved my goal of being less helpful and as a result, more helpful. It is working because my students are visibly more frustrated this year about lab reports.  I have had more one on one conversations about graphing this year than in previous years combined. During these discussions, I can help students think about data display without doing the thinking for them. The other result has been freeing up the lab report structure. Students have thought of interesting and unique ways of displaying their data. In the past, these students would not have had this opportunity.

The tricky component is figuring out the best balance between scaffolding and over-scaffolding. I have to be more mindful of when it's appropriate to provide models for students, mandate components and list requirements. My goal is to have fair assessments which require the greatest degree of critical thinking. 

Versatile Scheduling in a Flipped Class

I'm co-clerking a group charged with proposing a new schedule for the school. Part of the process entails getting feedback from the community. My department predictably prefers extended but less frequent meetings to accommodate labs. In the past, I would've considered lab periods as nonnegotiable in a new schedule. (Currently, middle science does not have lab periods.) However, I no longer have a burning need for the lab period model. This is all because of the flipped class. Now that direct instruction, including directions to labs, happen via video and hopefully out of class time, I no longer have those concerns. This is especially true in my asynchronous course. Since students are collecting data at different times, I don't have to slow down the entire class with step by step directions and fielding questions that other students don't need answered. When it's time for a small group to collect data, I am available to address their particular needs. Some groups are ready to go without any help from me, while others need one or two minutes of guidance. The result is an overall increased pace and more effective use of lab time. The other benefit is that I no longer need lab supplies to be available to all students in the same period. Again, leading to more effective use of time and created by the flipped class. 

The lone exception has been the Socrartic Seminars. Our periods are 44 minutes long, which could accommodate two discussions. I use the fishbowl model of concentric circles; the discussion takes place in the inner circle, while the rest of the class observes and takes notes to give feedback from the outer circle. Students switch their roles in the second discussion. I can have two engaging discussions with eight or so minutes to spare. Those eight minutes almost always get wasted. I could easily extend the discussions but I want my students to be able to get done work done every class. I've decided to have both seminars on consecutive days without the outer circle. This adjustment has worked well. While half of the class is engaged in discussion, the other half are getting work done. Even the students who participate in the seminar get half the period to do work. 

I don't know what kind of schedule models we will propose but I am comforted with the revelation that my flipped class will thrive in a variety of schedules. 

Leveraging the Power of Google Forms, Scripts and Formulae

Last week, I led two workshops at my school's professional development day. One was relevant to the flipped class. It was a presentation inspired by a webinar led by Ramsey Musallam. He framed the use of his tools as solutions to design problems. I took his lead and discussed VLookUp, Formemailer, editing the form confirmation page, and Flubaroo as solutions to four design problems in my flipped course. Incidentally, I learned about Formemailer and editing the form confirmation page from Ramsey as well.

Here is a link to my presentation and below is the YouTube playlist of my tutorial videos demonstrating how to use the relevant hacks, scripts and formulae in Google Forms. 

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.

The Results of a Semester of Flip Class

Now that a full semester is complete, I can judge the effectiveness of the change to flip class. The results confirm my perceptions of positive change. 

Results

1) Student achievement is up from previous years.

Quarter 4 of '12-'13 was first quarter of flipped class

2) Academic Notifications are progress reports sent home for struggling students. I have sent fewer academic notifications this year. 

 

3) The number of students averaging in the 90s has increased. 

4) There has been no change in the number of failing students

5) I have better relationships with students. I no longer have to manage behavior during content presentation; the most significant behavior issue I have to deal with now is making sure students are on task. More eighth graders have asked me for recommendations this year than in all the previous years combined. My job satisfaction has increased.

6) Since I have recuperated class time, there are more opportunities for project based learning. In previous years, I did not have any projects. This year, I had three projects in the first semester. 

Major adjustments from the first semester

1) I had a few horrendous workflow issues early in the first quarter. I required students to use multiple sources to acquire and keep track of work. After feedback from students, I streamlined this process. I created one assignment sheet with links to all handouts and assignments. 

At the beginning of this semester, I have done away with the tracking sheet since some students did not use it on a consistent basis. I opted to display the required weekly assignments in class; this information is also posted on the homepage of the website. This should greatly reduce any questions about expectations. 

2) The asynchronous nature of the course, made it difficult for students to work with different groups. In addition, it also diminished the community feel of each section. I started to use synchronous assignments to give students the opportunity to work as a class and with different individuals. Some synchronous activities are labs, Socratic Seminars, Peer Instruction and the projects. These have helped with both problems.

3) In the middle of quarter 1, I started to meet with individual students in class after failing a quiz. This helped me gauge their misunderstandings and suggest remedial activities. (Over the summer, I hope to increase my Library of remedial assignments.) I offered students an opportunity to retake part of the genetics exam, even though I did not have this plan. I allowed students to retake part of the exam if they submitted all outstanding work, retake any quizzes they did not receive perfect scores on, and submit test corrections. All but two students (out of 6 or 7) increased their test score in the retake. Even though they loathed the requirements, some told me that it helped them. Unfortunately, the two students who really would have benefited the most, did not take advantage of this opportunity. I'm unsure how to address this issue, other than explicitly including the offer in an Academic Notification. (I neglected to do this because I did not originally plan to allow students to do a retake.) 

Future adjustments in Semester 2:

1) More frequent check in times with students. Although, there are mandatory and optional check in assignments, I did not have an effective way to enforce them. I will be more diligent about checking in with students. This should help keep struggling students accountable (the tracking sheet did not work with struggling students because they typically ignored it.) This will also increase scores because some students neglected to show me assignments in previous quarters, even though they may have completed them. 

In general, I just need to hound kids more often. 

2) More optional assignments or components of assignments: I received some feedback that not all activities are required to understand some concepts. While I'm skeptical that all students can gauge what they need, I will be flexible with students who have demonstrated success. 

3) More engagement with my Personal Learning Network and resume weekly blog posts: in the first quarter I did not engage my PLN as often as during the summer. I regret missing consecutive Flip Class chats on Twitter. In December, I stopped posting weekly reflections to my blog. Even though some weeks are not note worthy, the habit forces me to reflect on successes and needed adjustments. I should at least draft a weekly reflection even if I choose not to post it to the blog. 

Institutional obstacles:

1) iPads are limited. 

• They don't reliably print. I'm not sure the nature of the issue. In semester one, I started to print copies of handouts but that caused a lot of waste. I will no longer print the handouts and will encourage students to use Notability and/or Google Drive. After a semester, 8th graders have a better handle on iPads.  
• These devices do not support Flash. I frequently use online simulations. It is unfortunate that students cannot use their devices for all work. It's hard to plan for laptop usage since the course is asynchronous.

2) Headphones: I should purchase a class set of headphones since some students neglect to bring headphones on a day they need to watch a video. In some instances, students are forced to watch the video in the hallway, which decreases my ability to hold them accountable. 

Conclusion: 
The first semester switch to the flipped class was a successful one. Students are performing better and my job satisfaction has improved. Even though there are still tweaks and improvements to be made, the outlook for this flipped class is positive!