#flipcon12 archives: Preparing for the Flip – The Nuts and Bolts of Flipping Your Classroom (Kim Duncan)

I was able to watch Kim's archived presentation from #flipcon12... here are some notes that stood out to me and my reflections...

I would highly suggest you check out the session yourself as well, because what stood out to me may not be what impacts you the most! :) 

Register for virtual access to all these sessions here.

Kim Duncan

Upper School Science Teacher

Flint Hill School

Oakton, VA

bit.ly/KimFlippedClassroom (? link didn't work for me?)

•  Four steps:
• Review/streamline classroom materials
• figure out what was essential and what was extra
• What content is really important?
• What can become part of an activity? (instead of being in the lecture!)
• How much practice is necessary? (everything else turned into "optional" practice problem)
• Clearly state your expectations
• for students (example: Before you join in on the activity, you must have the vodcast watched and the notes taken)
• High expectations, and check them on it! (she sent email to student and parent restating the expectations that day)
• What to look out for...
• Make sure parents are informed
• Get your administrators on board

I feel like I really started to do this about 4 years ago when I made my "Unit Maps" of concepts from each unit.  I do want to take it a step further and divide those concepts into "essential" and "secondary" (or even A,B,C categories like some teachers do).  So many things on my list, I really don't know if that will happen for this school year or during this school year (for next year).  But, it is there :)

I hadn't really thought about taking some stuff completely out of the lecture and making it into an activity.  This might be where some of my inquiry/discovery occurs this year, as I do want to explore what happens when I let my students discover things on their own.  (Definitely something I will be trying in my Math Analysis class way before Algebra 1...)

I feel like I do a good job of only assigning necessary practice and not just "drill and kill" them with too much practice.  On my list for the next month as I sort through my curriculum stuff is to have "extra practice problem" worksheets premade for each concept for the students to access.  I have always offered these upon request in the past, and not too many students took me up on it (I think they thought it would be too much work on my part).  But, with the program I use (KutaSoftware) it really doesn't take that long and I'll just link to them on my class blog.

I am very excited to start from day 1 with my expectations for students.  I plan on having expectations clearly laid out for students, parents, and teacher (me).  I'll post those here whenever I get them done!

• create hands-on support and practice activities
• "How do you know they watched the video?"
• Guided notes (really nice setup for guided notes with her powerpoint slides around 13min in video!) *Can export Pwpt slides to Microsoft Word to further edit! (Publish)
• Safety net
• Essential Questions
• Complete while watching videos
• Fosters independent learning; teaches them how to learn
• Have required problems and optional problems - can look at see which problems students chose to do and if they chose to do any of the optional problems.
• If they fake it, once we get into the activity, it's really obvious

Kim has a system very similar to mine with her guided notes packets. I couldn't agree more how effective the notes packets are in sooooooo many ways.  This is the first year I am incorporating all practice problems right in the packet instead of on a separate worksheet.  I think students like and crave structure, and providing them with the packets at the beginning of the unit allows them to know exactly what they need to learn, how much it is for the unit, and the activities they will need to complete to help master the material

• At first, "We can't stop you and ask questions right away".  Then, "You know, if we just keep listening, most of our questions get answered!) - That's why lectures in class take so long!
• Tried to turn as many of her worksheets into some sort of lab-based activity or demo
• How do you get the students who need to do extra practice to do it?
• That's what we have all that one-on-one time for!
• record and edit your lectures
• Nice thing: All your classes get the same video!

Never thought of this before, but it's true.  I would also either remember something later in the day, or forget it b/c I had already done the same lesson twice previously.  Now all students get the same content.

• What to look out for:
• Don't be a perfectionist!
• Don't dwell on the editing - you don't have to use all the cool features!
• one-on-one interaction and feedback
• *Most important thing!
• See each student every day
• Questions - do they really get it?
• Effective use of classroom time
• Students learning how to know when group work was beneficial and when they needed to work individually
• Ask for feedback! - ask what is working for them and what isn't... also good timing to give THEM feedback

Getting student feedback is essential in having them buy-in to this "change".  It is important that they know their opinions and feelings are valued and desired.  I would like to somehow get better feedback on each individual video/tutorial.  On Sophia, they can "rate" the tutorial, but that doesn't really tell me much as far as if they rated me 5 stars WHY it was so good or if they rated my 3 stars what was missing or could have been improved upon.  Maybe I can add a question to the end of the WSQ form that leaves it open for suggestions if something wasn't clear or if I didn't explain something well enough.  My only concern is that sometimes students really don't know how to be constructive in their comments (I guess there's no time like the present to learn!) and receiving feedback nightly might get a little overbearing for me...