to flip or not to flilp?

Before Thanksgiving I made a quick decision not to flip a weeks worth of lessons based on a post I read on Ramsey Musallam's killer blog on flipped teaching.

The topic was universal gravitation and the core idea revolves around the relationship between the attraction of gravity between two objects if A: distance changes, B: mass changes.  The challenge that I find with this unit is that there are very few personal experiences that students (or anyone) has experienced on the topic.  

Beyond, bouncing astronauts and zero gravity movie space scenes, there is little experience (or interest) in changing gravitational fields.  I'm quite certain there is something that I am missing as far as proper instruction and leadership that could instantly change this scenario, for now I will work with what I have available to me.

To the point, this is the third time I have moved through this content and I can predict a high need for extra explanations due to a uniformly low amount of background knowledge and conceptual basis.  I am quite proud of this decision as it demonstrates that my interest in furthering this flipped experiment, does not blind me to what reason calls for.

Direct instruction is still good and will always have a place in teaching.  It is also extremely efficient when everyone is at the same place and has similar needs.  Although it does not have the sex appeal of digital lessons, differentiation, or PBL, I can say with a fair amount of certainty that in my classroom there will always be some room for a teacher standing in front of the room talking to a large group of students.  Especially if that teacher (me someday) is a master in the content, which means there is a tight understanding in what examples best serve the transfer of the idea as well as what prompts best encourage mental engagement and thought.

Cheers :)

The Fallacy of Precocity

or..."I'm not a smart kid, I'm in algebra I"

Malcolm Gladwell speaks about this idea at length in his awesome lecture found here, don't have an hour (also available on 92Y itunes account to listen whenever) here is a summary which this post is based on.

Prodigies are easy. They advertise their genius from the get-go. Late bloomers are hard. They require forbearance and blind faith. (Let’s just be thankful that Cézanne didn’t have a guidance counsellor in high school who looked at his primitive sketches and told him to try accounting.) Whenever we find a late bloomer, we can’t but wonder how many others like him or her we have thwarted because we prematurely judged their talents. But we also have to accept that there’s nothing we can do about it. How can we ever know which of the failures will end up blooming?  The problem is that we identify talented kids by their ability to learn things, and we identify talented adults is by the ability to do things.  Yet the difference between learning and doing is the difference between black and white.

Rest of Article

I personally struggled (well maybe not struggled, but I was certainly aware of it) with classification in school. In elementary my friends were in Gifted and Talented and I wanted to go with them to do the cool stuff they talked about (we are talking 3rd grade here), I don't remember the explanation as to why only some 8 year olds got to go the "gifted and talented" class, but I am sure it was rich.

In 7th grade I wanted to be in pre-algebra with my friends, so much so that one day I got a bathroom pass, walked into Mrs Drakes 2nd period class with my friends in it and asked if I could be in the class.  How would you handle this situation?  I really wanted to be in the class, and although I never felt "dumb" because of the classes I was in, I quickly figured out I wasn't one of the smart kids...

... and by 9th grade, I stopped asking.  I didn't enroll in AP courses when given the chance, and I only took one honors class (H Spanish 3, which was a joke by the way that I got a credit boost for that class) when a teacher said he/she thought I would be successful at that level.  This is the challenge of a system that has certain gatekeepers to achieve at a certain level.  I lost all agency in determining how high I could go.  The bar had been set, I knew what kind of student I was and worked hard to do the best I could at that level.

The problem lies in the focused linear and non-permeable lines we draw for students to move through school.  I feel like online lessons can work to undue this problem.  I am delivering content through Youtube videos that I make and let students work through material asynchronously, sometimes in class, sometimes at home.  I'm trying to introduce the business concept of ROWE, into my classroom (thanks Daniel Pink!).

This year I have asked our AP physics teacher to list one or two ideas per unit that I can present the students that he would like them to be familiar with coming into AP physics.  Students can self-select into this content should a bolt of confidence strike them given their progress on any given idea.  Having produced the lesson and practice online, I am not responsible for the differentiation that comes with inviting students to choose to do this work.  I only have to be there for support when they come to bumps in the road.

The big picture is this class, for any student, at any time, can morph into a H Physics class as the students choose to.  Students have a choice to push themselves to that level that is never there once you enter the College prep track.  The open ceiling also includes a clear well defined floor.  If you can do these things (insert list of essential core standards of passing a class here), you are guaranteed a C.  One teachers comment.

"So you have asking them to do the work in your class, that they used to have to do in G (general) Physics".

My response was yes! the only difference being that with confidence and encouragement, that student can self select into more challenging work at any time.  Where as once they were enrolled in the G course, that was all they were going to be exposed to all year long.

It's important to note that everyone (teachers) would prefer school to be this way, we have simply been lacking the tools to make it viable....until now :)

Cheers!

Mastery Teaching

Otherwise known as Standards Based Grading....

if you are not familiar with either term, or just want to be inspired watch this video by Dr. Tae the skateboarding physics professor and assessment reform proponent.  The first 8 min are epic.

If you are familiar with this the term skip down about 2 paragraphs.

I was having dinner with my wife the other night and I was sharing the model for the flipped classroom with her and accidentally used the term Mastery Teaching (from Bergmann and Sams book and other stuff from the 1980s) instead of Standards Based Grading.  My wife stopped me and asked me what "Mastery Teaching" was (she is a principle and is very familiar with what I do).  I shared with her how it is another term for SBG that I have come to describe in elevator pitch mode as

"A method of instruction and assessment that allows the teacher, as well as the student to know exactly where they are on the path to mastery".

She loved it! not the specific idea, she is an administrator and knows all about SBG.  What she was interested in was two things 1st: the cultural implications of the term "Mastery Teaching", she felt that it implied the teachers role in moving students toward mastery is at the core of the assessment system.  2nd:  She didn't know what it meant and was curious to ask...as opposed to "Standards Based Grading" which is getting dangerously close to being a "thing" that everyone feels like they know what it is (which can be dangerous).

Mastery Teaching is essential for flipping given that the criteria focus makes the videos and subsequent assessment to follow, manageable by students and parents who may not have any previous experience in our own content areas.

Here is a link to one of my current unit plans...science teacher or familiar with the material?  please offer ideas for improvement.  One of the biggest changes I made this year is a move away from a descriptor model of "Basic", "Proficient", and "Advanced"...as students were beginning to adopt the labels and apply them to their own fixed mindset (thanks Carol Dweck).  That is to say, after a few units students began to believe they would never be able to access "Advanced" content, and therefore tended to check out on those days lessons.

Differentiated Suprise

Student have different needs...all of them...all the time

(friggin awesome video by the way, thanks Tammy Heflebower!)

After my first week of out of the lab flipping (that is too say instead of practicing in the computer lab, they actually did the work at home).  I came a cross a curious senario. 

Big gaps in needs based on assessment results on the idea that we covered (Newton's 2nd Law).  Some students totally understood what I asked them to learn.  Other students understood the core idea, but have gaps in their ability to take it to the next level when it comes to 2nd Law.  Other's are lacking application and understanding of the basics.  Once upon a time...next topic, or work my but off to create a 3 tiered lesson, mostly help one group while managing the others.

Now that I have been busting my but to produce online content in order to flip, I find myself uniquely qualified to handle the problem in a non-flipped way, using the material I have created.  

Group 1:  8-12 kids with me working in groups of two at the most in the front center of classroom.  Use a preexisting worksheet that I had that covers the three levels of understanding.  

Group 2:  5 or 6 kids can work on the following:  create extra problems with explanations on the computers (that I have attained through grants) show the set up and explain how to solve it or...move on to extra credit content requested by our AP physics teacher.  Both options I love by the way, they are making stuff that will be posted on my website to help other students who need more practice (and probably explain it better than I do) or do work that I regret is not worth presenting to the whole class. 

Group 3:  Students with holes in their learning working in groups of three or four.  Individually these student's don't understand everything, collectively 1 in 4 can help on any particular problem, question, idea.

The best thing about this lesson was my prep time was already paid when I created my lessons and coached them on how to navigate the content.  The membrane between the groups was semi-pearmeable (I'm teaching two sections of biology this year), that is to say students could demonstrate a level of learning and move to a different group or assignment.  Finally...it worked!  

I had a room full of people not just working, but doing the right work for them.  This is very difficult to plan, but the flipped culture (not just the structure) allowed the students to completely understand the design of what we were doing this day.  

Given that I am regularly struggling with actually home participation (more on my soon to be weekly "by the numbers" blog post) in the lesson viewing it is important for me to focus on small victories.  

Is this a victory?  Many that could be watching them at home are not.  The test is friday and purhaps the results will provide opportunity for a "come to jesus" talk about their own levels of participation.  

What if the home participation is low, but the test results are better than last year given the change in lesson delivery (even if it is mostly still happening in class)?

thoughts?

Cheers

Week 2: Agency

agen·cy

 noun \ˈā-jən(t)-sē\

plural agen·cies

Definition of AGENCY

1

a : the office or function of an agent

b : the relationship between a principal and that person's agent

2

: the capacity, condition, or state of acting or of exerting power : operation

3

: a person or thing through which power is 

exerted or an end is achieved : 

4

: an establishment engaged in doing business for another <an advertising agency>

5

: an administrative division (as of a government) <the agencyfor consumer protection

So far the classroom is barely flipping, I'm really struggling with curriculum pacing mixed with practice, application, and labs. There isn't really "homework" anymore...just work.

Lack of solid design, direction, and structure hurts my chances at a successful flip. By success I mean the biggest thing most teachers I know are curious about. Will the students watch the lessons at home?

Most students continue to do stuff in house...which is not what I hoped for, but it's early.  What this in class practice and experiment with unit pacing has produced is a high amount of student agency. They regularly choose what to do next based on personal progress.  After our initial, inquiry experiment that lets them feel what we are about to get into (example:  inertia olympics), the week then opens up into a list of objectives, with assessments coming mid week or end of week (or both) depending on the size of the idea.

There are early signs that students have the potential to work the system if I could ever figure out how to lead them through it. Their video lessons involve an intro with examples of things they should know or be able to do already. Then reminded that if they do not understand this base idea, to follow a link to the precious lesson.

And it worked...students were regularly making the right decision about what to be doing...which is awesome by the way. When they start a day based on their needs, they respond better to peer and teacher support. They make better decisions about what to work on after the lesson and who to work with.

So far I cannot claim that my students are doing more work, or if they are it isn't noticeable. What I see without a doubt, is student doing more of the right work...and my friday assessment results reflected that. I need to share this with my class and share that this first step...good decision making and self directed progress is a first step. The next move is to utilize home access to increase support time in class and take it to the next level.

More on this topic on my post about a differenciated suprise!