Over the next year, I'll be revisiting some of my
favorite (and most popular) posts from the last (almost) 5 years of blogging.
I hope to add extra insight and reflection to these posts from my
experiences both in my classroom and in training and coaching other teachers
with flipped learning. Any changes from the original post are changed
to blue
font.
The WSQ method has been the most impactful strategy in my flipped classroom
experience. It gives some structure and a consistent routine for both
teachers and students to thrive in what is most likely a new learning
environment. In addition, I believe it answers what I have come to
believe are the "5 Questions Every Flipped Classroom Teacher Must
Answer". While there is definitely more than one way to
answer these questions, I have found that the WSQ method addresses all of these
questions and allows you to have all 5 X's in the image below.
If you are interested in
learning more about the WSQ strategy, I recommend that you check out my book, Flipping with Kirch:
The Ups and Downs from Inside my Flipped Classroom, which was released in May of
2016.
- 1. How will you organize your content and materials in a way that is easy for students to access and follow?
- 2. How will you hold students accountable for actually watching and engaging with the video content?
- 3. How will you structure in processing time for your students to make sense of the material and internalize it?
- 4. How will you gather feedback from your students before they come to class, so you can effectively structure class time to meet their needs?
- 5. How will you facilitate discussion, collaboration, and higher-order thinking among students during class time?
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~Original Post Below~
Any changes from the original post are changed
to blue
font.
A
"WSQ" (pronounced wisk) in my class is what we call
"homework" in my flipped classroom. It stands for this:
W - Watch
Students must watch the
video for the assigned lesson and take notes in their SSS packets (this stands
for "Student Success Sheets" and I have them for each unit/chapter; see more info on my FAQ page here) I have created for
them. I check to see that these notes are complete and thorough and that
everything I wrote down the students have. Because they can pause and
rewind, there is no exception for these notes not being well done and complete. I don't spend class time specifically checking
notes - I look at them while the students are working and I'm visiting with
each group. So, they know the notes will be checked at some point, but
I'm not going to waste 5-10 minutes of class time checking them.
Some of my very high
achieving students have asked "Do I have to watch the video" and
under certain circumstances, I say "no", but you still have to
complete the notes on the SSS packet. A lot of times these students know how to
figure out the problems without my explanation and I have no problem with them
completing the notes that way. They have to check their SSS page versus the
finished SSS page on Edmodo to make sure their notation and answers are
correct. I rarely had a lot of
students do this - only the top few each year would consider it.
A few issues I am
already noticing with this is that there are still important things that I say
about the concepts that students miss if they don't watch the video. This
includes details about how/why we do something, details about notation, etc. Some
thoughts that have come to my mind to alleviate this is to divide the videos
into sections (whether this becomes separate videos or just a heading on the
video). The first portion of the video must be watched by all students of all
levels and will cover the basics, vocabulary, notation, purpose, etc. Then, the
second half will cover the few examples I go over for the students before their
first class day. I'll still have to think about this. Thoughts? Update: As time went on, this is what I did. I
normally had an intro to the concept and all examples were worked out on
separate videos. Sometimes there was one example video, other times there
were 2 - an "easy" examples video and a "medium" examples
video. "Hard" problems were almost always reserved for class
time where there was collaboration and immediate support.
For my Algebra 1
students, I already have been making an additional "part 2" of most
videos that has even more extra examples than in the main video for students to
watch or go back to later. I like that setup because the main video covers 2-3
examples, depending on the length of the problem. However, in my SSS packet I
have at least twice as many examples for students to work through. I still want
those to be explained to the students; I figure the more the better! Then they
have no excuses! Having the extra examples
was valuable. When students need additional practice or review, they are
right there for them. When I need to fresh example to help explain
something, I don't have to go find one. I definitely recommend this!
There is also the underlying thought in the back of students' heads of
"Gosh, I'm glad the video didn't cover ALL these examples!"
They are grateful that it is shorter.
S - Summary
Students have to write a
summary of what they watched in the video. This is supposed to be completed
immediately after watching to pretty much judge "Did you understand what
you just watched?" I tell the students that their summary tells me if they
understood the video or not. If I can't make sense of their summary, then they
probably didn't understand it well enough because they couldn't verbalize it. I
tell them that if they can't summarize it, they need to re-watch it because
they didn't get it. If you
have read other posts on this blog, you know that this evolved to consist of
lots of types of summaries - full summaries, guided summaries, guided summaries
with sentence frames, etc. Whatever scaffolds my students needed to help
learn how to effectively summarize and show their ability to process the video
content, that's what I found a way to do. You can learn more details of
all the ways to approach the "S" part of the WSQ in Flipping with Kirch: The Ups and Downs from Inside my
Flipped Classroom,
In class, we talk about
the summaries. Since I just started this, we are doing this mostly as a
whole-class activity to train the students on what I expect to see. We put a
"WSQ" on the screen and read through it. Then, I have all the
students vote if they think it was a "Great" "Good" or
"Bad" summary of what we watched. Yes, I have had all three levels of
summaries and students have realized that if their summary is bad we will say
so and talk about it. I ask the student whose notebook is on the screen what
they would vote for themselves and then we talk as a class or in their small
groups about what is missing, or what pieces that are in there are the REALLY
IMPORTANT pieces that should definitely be included. I have students look at
their individual WSQ's, give themselves a grade, and add anything they were
missing. This was a hugely
important "training" piece to what I now called "WSQ
Chats". It's just one of about 20 methods I describe in Flipping with Kirch: The Ups and Downs from Inside my
Flipped Classroom,
The whole-class norming takes up more class time than you may prefer, but
as I always tell teachers when I'm training them - better to spend a lot of
time those first few weeks setting the bar high for what you expect than to
spend the entire year frustrated that students continually are falling short of
your hopes.
My ultimate goal is that
we only have to do the whole-class "norming" process once a week or
even once a unit. The rest of the time, the students will be sharing and
discussing their summaries in their small "WSQ groups" of four
students. That way every student has a chance to talk every day and they are
all held more accountable. I want students to be okay talking about what is
both good and bad about their summary and realizing what important pieces need
to be added. Reflecting back now about
4.5 years later, I never really did this past the beginning of the year and I
think it would have been helpful to do it once a month or once a unit.
In my Algebra 1 class, I
actually wrote an entire summary with the class all the way through one day. It
was a pretty complex lesson on Graphing Systems of Linear Inequalities and I
wasn't really happy with the WSQ that was put on the screen. I realized that my
students might need a better model of what I am truly looking for, rather than
always calling their summaries "bad" or "good minus" (I let
them grade themselves as Great +, Great, Great -, Good +, Good, Good -, Bad +,
Bad, or Bad -). I think it was one of the most beneficial times for my students
to realize what a good and complete and DETAILED summary should look like. That
also may be something I need to model once a unit or so to get my students back
on track.
Most of all, the purpose
of the summary is to get my students Thinking & Writing (at home), and Reading, Speaking, and
Listening (at school) - it all comes down to TWRLS... we need to
support our students' language development at all grade levels and in all
subjects.
Q - Question
At the end of the WSQ,
all students must ask a question. The first few days I did this, I had a lot of
students respond with "I don't have any questions". They quickly
learned that is not an acceptable answer. The question must be related to the
content and can be:
(1) A specific question
about an example that was worked out and where they got stuck or confused
(2) A general question about the concept and something that was said or explained
or (most of the time)
(3) A question that could be asked and expected to be answered after watching the video. This may be a question you think your classmates might have, or just a good question you think I (the teacher) would ask and expect you to know.
(2) A general question about the concept and something that was said or explained
or (most of the time)
(3) A question that could be asked and expected to be answered after watching the video. This may be a question you think your classmates might have, or just a good question you think I (the teacher) would ask and expect you to know.
I've streamlined this to be "Ask a Question that is either a Confusion, Clarification, Discussion, or Example".
In class, we look at a
few questions as a group, and I always ask the writer "Is this a question
you know the answer to or don't know the answer to?". Then, I have the
students answer the question in their small groups and then we share out to the
class.
The purpose of this is
two-fold:
(1) I want my students comfortable asking and answering questions of each other, especially when they are confused.
(2) I just want my students asking questions, period! That is where discussion and deeper thought come from!
(1) I want my students comfortable asking and answering questions of each other, especially when they are confused.
(2) I just want my students asking questions, period! That is where discussion and deeper thought come from!
Every day, students ask
their questions in their groups of four before getting to work on the problem
set. That way, students who have a question they DON'T know the answer to can
get it answered, and students who asked a question they already know can see if
their group members also know it. I am there to help if the group gets stuck on
answering a question.
I found lots of other
strategies in working with questions as time went on since this original post.
I'm sure I'll have a repost explaining that soon ;).
With my Math Analysis
Honors students, we go a step further... I challenge them to make their questions "HOT" and
move up Bloom's Taxonomy past the basic Knowledge and Comprehension level. I
have them tell me what level they think their question is at. I have given them
the question starters for each level of questioning (see link on top right) and
I think that helps them. The better their questions, the deeper we can probe,
and the better discussions we can have.
TWO WEEK REFLECTION
When I came up with this
WSQ idea at the start of the new year, I really didn't have a clear vision of
what it would look like. What I described above came out of random thought, to
be honest. Every day though, I was able to think about what I liked and didn't
like about the process, and the students got used to what I expect. Reflection Reflection Reflection is key to any teacher's
success, not just a flipped classroom teacher. You've got to continually
Reflect, Reach Out to others for ideas, and Refine your practices so they are
meeting the purposes that you have intentionally set.
I am already
SOOOOOOOOOOOO HAPPY with what I have been seeing and we have only done this for
9 or 10 class days! I really hope my students continue to develop their TWRLS,
which ultimately I hope leads to them not only understanding the math BETTER
but DEEPER!!!
Purchase my new book today! Click here for more details and to place an order! Also on Amazon.com at bit.ly/fwkirch
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