In Summary:

1. Flipped classrooms reverse the traditional contexts and structures of content delivery and application of learning. They take lecture and content transmission out of the classroom and encourage higher cognitive levels of knowledge acquisition during the in-person class time.  Flipped classrooms also allow for a high level of differentiation, resulting in greater impacts for diverse groups of learners.
2. Flipped classrooms, according to some research models such as the SAMR enable us as educators to create spaces to support inquiry, diversity and put the ownership of learning on the student.
3. Flipped classrooms can be brought in partially or completely, and fulfill many different needs in the classroom.  They can also encourage more efficient and strategic use of physical space and teacher resources.

Reflection:

This site was shared with 38 students in the Masters of Educational Technology course ETEC 522 Ventures in Educational Technology in October 2015.  For each of the sections, the learners participated in activities and discussions in a separate learning management system.

Among the key points that many of the learners shared were:

1. Ongoing, well-supported professional development must be top of mind/top priority in order to ensure any amount of uptake or success for these strategies.
2. This professional development should be designed to “put teachers in students shoes” so that they can experience this type of strategy from a learners perspective. Templates, and modelling by early adopters of these types of strategies would also be helpful.
3. Fostering of champions, possibly through funding release time, will help to promote use of these strategies among teaching communities.
4. We can’t lose sight of the fact that not only will teachers and schools need to be properly equipped, but also students who don’t necessarily have the access to suitable equipment for the roll out of flipped or blended approaches. Also, if students are provided with devices on-site, coverage for supervision of “after hours” use should be considered.
5. Increased up-front prep time is a reality of these types of teaching strategies – this should be acknowledged and supported.
6. We should be wary of these types of approaches being used, in the long term, as justifications for potentially harmful reductions in overall spending on education, rather than re-allocation of resources for better learning outcomes.
7. Teachers should be given more opportunities to contribute in a meaningful way to this type of decision-making.
8. Models such as the SECTIONS framework are very helpful when considering how to allocate spending for these types of technology-based initiatives.

Excellent ideas were shared  for blended and flipped  classroom models for a variety of grade levels. From examples in  a Science 10 class to the appropriateness of blended and flipped in the elementary classrooms, most educators are excited about the possibilities of  incorporating  at least parts of the  model in their teaching/learning environments.

Key themes which arose from the Educator posts:

• Making even small changes to your practice to incorporate some blended classroom components leads to higher engagement for students
• There will be barriers to overcome as students get used to a new way of doing things, or struggle with access out of the classroom and that is to be expected and planned for. Change is hard.
• There is a very broad definition of flipped/blended learning environments, which can include virtual/online schools with synchronous communication opportunities
• This model truly supports project or inquiry-based learning
• Access to resources for students as and when they need it supports the principles of Universal Design and thus differentiation of instruction

Key Themes which arose from the Learner posts:

• Authors felt that learners need to be highly organized, self-motivated, have good time management skills, skilled at technology, and perseverance.
• These characteristics and others that are similar are usually found in successful students whether they are in a blended/flipped classroom or not.
• Confidence was noted as a trait that could be improved in a blended/flipped classroom.
• Authors also reported that the material needs to be interesting, engaging, and well-planned.

Some things to note from the pre/post survey

1. Responders felt that the OER increased their understanding
2. The percent of responders (but not the number) who thought it would be labour intensive increased (opposite of what I thought would happen).
3. The percent of responders who thought it would work for all levels of education dropped (opposite of what I thought would happen again!)
4. All responders would consider this for their classroom in the post survey.
5. Concerns for technology increased in the post survey.

Survey Results as of Oct 25, 2015

For additional materials and readings, go to our References/Optional Resources page.