I have been hearing things about flipped classrooms from several people in several places this semester. It seems to be one of those "all the rage" topics in education right now, at least for a certain community of flipped classroom enthusiasts. The basic idea is that the students watch video lectures (whether traditional teacher-in-front-of-the-whiteboard style or something more creative) at home to learn new material the day before they use it in class. What used to be done while sitting in a classroom becomes homework, and what used to be homework moves to the classroom where the students can work with their peers and ask questions of their teacher. The first time I heard about it, I believe my reaction was, "Wait...what?!"
Perhaps it goes hand in hand with my old lady-esque resistance to new technology (which I'm trying to get over), but the idea just seemed crazy to me. I must admit, though, that I wanted to learn more about it. As it turns out, three of my fellow math majors are student teaching in flipped classrooms for Algebra 2 and Geometry. They have had different experiences and challenges with it, and what worries me the most is how realistic (or not) it is to flip a classroom in a school district that doesn't provide access to computers or tablets for all of its students and doesn't have a serious issue with students not being accountable for doing their homework. If the students don't have access to the proper technology to watch the lectures or just plain don't do their homework, they will never learn the material in the first place, which prevents them from being able to use it in the classroom.
After thinking about this at different points over the past couple of months, we ended up having a guest speaker in class who flipped his Physics classroom and has created some pretty amazing videos that would be the homework. He was beyond passionate, beyond enthusiastic, and he had me with one foot firmly on the flipped classroom bandwagon and the other close behind until one of my classmates started to ask some really important questions. What if the students just don't watch the lectures? What if they don't respond to you when you express the importance of doing so? What if your class isn't an advanced course full of highly motivated upperclassmen who chose to take it? What if your students have a lot of trouble getting their hands on the technology to watch the lectures at home? What if, what if, what if?
Alas, off I jumped from the bandwagon, but my exit may not be permanent. What I need is more information about how best to implement a flipped classroom style, as well as more comprehensive data on the impact of doing so on student learning and performance. I'm still very interested in how it might be effective in some of my future math classrooms, but I'm cautious (if not a bit skeptical) for now. I do think that a flipped model could work with my accelerated Pre-Calculus students in my field placement. They're motivated, they all have access to the proper technology, and they work well in partners and small groups when asked. Quite to the contrary, I think the flipped model would fail miserably for a good portion of the ninth graders in my Algebra 1 classes. There are so many of them who don't do their homework, and I don't think that would change under the flipped model. When the homework is learning the material for the first time, as opposed to applying the material that was learned in class earlier that day, I think the stakes are too high to risk a decent portion of my students not watching the videos.
Thursday, October 31
Podcasting in the Classroom
Over the past several weeks, I have enjoyed listening to my classmates present on a variety of technological tools. The main focus of these presentations has been the potential for using these tools in a classroom setting, and it has been really interesting to hear everyone's ideas for using them in different content areas. The presentation that I found to be the most intriguing was the one about podcasting. I'm sure that part of the intrigue was due to the creative, engaging presentation (shout out to SB, RB, MB, and GP), but I will definitely give some credit to the tool itself.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again: I am quite possibly the opposite of tech savvy. I don't like to try new technology. I may even be afraid of it. However, it seems that this class is determined to make me face my fears time and again. For the most part, this has turned out well, and my mind is slowly opening to the idea of using more technology in my own classroom some day. As a future math teacher, I often struggle to think of meaningful, worthwhile tools to use in a math classroom. The ideas that my fellow math majors and I come up with feel forced a lot of the time, and I don't support the use of technology for technology's sake. I have to be honest, though. I really want to find a way to use podcasting in my math classroom.
What I really liked about the tool, (I believe my classmates used Garage Band in their presentation), was the relative ease of use and the ability to create rather sophisticated sounding products without using complicated equipment or becoming some kind of an expert. I walked away from the presentation feeling confident that I could do what my classmates had done (and they made some pretty nifty podcasts), which is not typical of me at all. The sound effects, the background tracks, the layering of different voices, it was just plain cool, and I think that students would really enjoy listening to podcasts and creating their own.
One of the ideas that the other math majors and I came up with for using podcasting in a math classroom is to have students listen to podcasts that are already out there about seeing and using math in the real world. In my brief experience as a student teacher, I have already been asked by my students multiple times about when they will really "need to use this stuff." This could be one way to answer that question. Another idea that we had was for students to create their own podcasts in small groups. They could explain a new concept knowing that their podcast would be used to introduce that concept to every section of their subject (e.g., Algebra 1). One problem with this idea is that math is a very visual subject, so it might be difficult to explain a concept only using audio. To help us with this roadblock, one of the presenters told us about vodcasting, which is basically podcasting with a visual element added in. This is something that I definitely want to explore because I see a lot of potential for getting students excited about learning a new concept and explaining it to their peers through vodcasting.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again: I am quite possibly the opposite of tech savvy. I don't like to try new technology. I may even be afraid of it. However, it seems that this class is determined to make me face my fears time and again. For the most part, this has turned out well, and my mind is slowly opening to the idea of using more technology in my own classroom some day. As a future math teacher, I often struggle to think of meaningful, worthwhile tools to use in a math classroom. The ideas that my fellow math majors and I come up with feel forced a lot of the time, and I don't support the use of technology for technology's sake. I have to be honest, though. I really want to find a way to use podcasting in my math classroom.
What I really liked about the tool, (I believe my classmates used Garage Band in their presentation), was the relative ease of use and the ability to create rather sophisticated sounding products without using complicated equipment or becoming some kind of an expert. I walked away from the presentation feeling confident that I could do what my classmates had done (and they made some pretty nifty podcasts), which is not typical of me at all. The sound effects, the background tracks, the layering of different voices, it was just plain cool, and I think that students would really enjoy listening to podcasts and creating their own.
One of the ideas that the other math majors and I came up with for using podcasting in a math classroom is to have students listen to podcasts that are already out there about seeing and using math in the real world. In my brief experience as a student teacher, I have already been asked by my students multiple times about when they will really "need to use this stuff." This could be one way to answer that question. Another idea that we had was for students to create their own podcasts in small groups. They could explain a new concept knowing that their podcast would be used to introduce that concept to every section of their subject (e.g., Algebra 1). One problem with this idea is that math is a very visual subject, so it might be difficult to explain a concept only using audio. To help us with this roadblock, one of the presenters told us about vodcasting, which is basically podcasting with a visual element added in. This is something that I definitely want to explore because I see a lot of potential for getting students excited about learning a new concept and explaining it to their peers through vodcasting.
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