The Flippin' Classroom

Thanks to the Twitter community I have returned to school this term with renewed energy and enthusiasm to experiment. One idea that receives a lot of attention and is frequently revisited is the flipped classroom - where content learning takes place prior to the lesson allowing more opportunities to apply the learning in the class. This is by no means a new idea, setting homework as preparation for lessons has been around for years, but with the advent of social media this is fast becoming a powerful learning tool in the 21st century school.

Breaking away from the delivery of content in the lesson is a positive and refreshing move. In many respects classrooms are not ideal learning environments because of the large numer of people in one room. Learning can sometimes be restricted by the very person who is meant to be facilitating it. Didactic teaching, however engaging you might be, is not an effective technique for most learners. The notion of wise teachers filling up young minds with knowledge can stay with Mr Gradgrind. Knowledge is no longer the captive of the educated - a swipe and a search on any smartphone will set free most of the world's wonders which had previously relied on educators to allow students into the secret. Teachers should facilitate learning and structuring activities around the concept of the flipped classroom takes more preparation and thought than a didactic monologue.

Frequently preparatory tasks are paper based, as in, 'read this before the next lesson', resulting in very little engagement or learning. The teacher is still required to go through the content essentially in the same detail as they would have done without the reading. Access to social media allows this content learning to be more interactive, meaningful and therefore effective. Videos, especially created by the teacher, are an increasingly common tool for the flipped classroom. The Khan Academy and other video sharing sites (see earlier blog) are well-suited for this kind of activity. But it becomes most effective when the teacher starts to plan tasks around the stimulus material such as questions relating to the video or collaborative online activities using, for example Google Docs. This also allows the teacher to have a better grasp on whether the students have actually engaged with the material and can also inform their planning for the forthcoming lessons.

With more teachers embracing social media and the innovative strategies that they complement the flippin' classroom might just have got a little bit more exciting.