I was able to go to two sessions on Tuesday, and they were both fantastic! Joe Liaw did a presentation on Moodle and Ellen Dill on her research with the flipped class in her French Classes.
Moodle is a great resource for organizing videos, resources and assignments as well as an online assessing tool. In the past, I have always felt that Moodle was a resource for Math and Science teachers because of the ease of creating online testing for their content area. Before attending the conference I was already learning more about Moodle and wondering if it was a viable solution for the language class too.
While listening to Joe's presentation, I am convinced that Moodle is the direction that I am moving in for next year. I want to not only have a place to house my videos and documents, but give the students an opportunity to take practice quizzes and even do some basic checks for understanding and comprehension in an online format. I also want to give students the opportunity to complete more practice assignments online (without paper and terrible handwriting!). Additionally, Moodle has the capability to do online blogging and I really want to get students writing everyday. I am so glad that I have Joe as a resource to ask questions about Moodle when I need it. Joe has also shared some Moodle resources just for language teachers which I will post about after the conference.
For my final session I went to see Ellen Dill. I was very interested to see the research that she was able to compile about the success of the flipped classroom. I have so many people ask me about "proving" that my students are more successful and because I restructured my curriculum as well as moving to the flip, I really can't do that. Ellen had some great ideas and great feedback from her students. It was awesome to see the graphs and numbers that proved what I already know....flipping the language classroom works!
The best part of the conference is not really the sessions, but being able to network with the other flippers and future flippers. If there is one thing I have learned as a language flipper is that I need to be ready to look outside my content area to find ideas and nuggets of information because there aren't so many of us out there (or here in Chicago). However I will say that the language flippers and future flippers that I have met here have tons of ideas and enthusiasm! Can't wait for tomorrow!
Showing posts with label research. Show all posts
Showing posts with label research. Show all posts
Wednesday, June 20, 2012
Saturday, March 31, 2012
Flipped Classroom Research
In rationalizing my procrastination of grading my projects from my last unit assessment, I have been doing quite a bit of research on the flipped classroom and what people are saying about it. I have added some great blogs that I am following that are full of information. I also was just reading this article which does a great job illustrating what really needs to go into the planning of a flipped classroom. http://usergeneratededucation.wordpress.com/2011/06/13/the-flipped-classroom-model-a-full-picture/
With the Khan Academy appearing on 60 minutes a few weeks ago, there seems to be increased buzz about the flipped classroom. I have gotten some great emails from some folks asking the hard questions like, "Now that I have the time in class, what do I do with it?". Taking lectures out of the classroom is only the smallest part of the flipped classroom model. Teachers really need to thoughtfully reflect on their assignments, assessments and class activities.
I know I have mentioned before that one of my rules of thumb for assessments is that the kids shouldn't be able to quickly Google all of the answers. When originally making the thematic plans for the year, I made sure that I chose a variety of types of assessments: some are presentational, some are interpersonal. They are equally divided between written and speaking. In benchmark assessments, I require students to use the vocabulary and grammatical concepts. I don't ask them to regurgitate a list or just conjugate in verb boxes. I always try to incorporate higher level thinking questions from the culture in the unit. For example, I might ask 1. What was the major reason for the Spanish Civil War? but I also ask 2. Why do you think that is important? or 3. How did that effect the rest of the world? or 4. Do you think the Spanish Civil War impacted our world today and why?
Fun is important, but it does need to be relevant. There is nothing students like more than skits. We just did some quick ones for the detective unit and they were great. They were the kids applying what they have learned, and isn't that what we want as teachers? We also played CLUE. The kids couldn't say anything except in Spanish, and although the kids were pretty quiet for a while, they couldn't stay that way for the entire game and soon the Spanish was flowing.
I am always looking for new ideas and activities, and I am always looking for ways to improve. For all my new readers, please add comments, send me an email. If there is one thing all the research has shown me is that teachers need to work together toward the common goal......creating thinkers, not just passing out diplomas.
With the Khan Academy appearing on 60 minutes a few weeks ago, there seems to be increased buzz about the flipped classroom. I have gotten some great emails from some folks asking the hard questions like, "Now that I have the time in class, what do I do with it?". Taking lectures out of the classroom is only the smallest part of the flipped classroom model. Teachers really need to thoughtfully reflect on their assignments, assessments and class activities.
I know I have mentioned before that one of my rules of thumb for assessments is that the kids shouldn't be able to quickly Google all of the answers. When originally making the thematic plans for the year, I made sure that I chose a variety of types of assessments: some are presentational, some are interpersonal. They are equally divided between written and speaking. In benchmark assessments, I require students to use the vocabulary and grammatical concepts. I don't ask them to regurgitate a list or just conjugate in verb boxes. I always try to incorporate higher level thinking questions from the culture in the unit. For example, I might ask 1. What was the major reason for the Spanish Civil War? but I also ask 2. Why do you think that is important? or 3. How did that effect the rest of the world? or 4. Do you think the Spanish Civil War impacted our world today and why?
Fun is important, but it does need to be relevant. There is nothing students like more than skits. We just did some quick ones for the detective unit and they were great. They were the kids applying what they have learned, and isn't that what we want as teachers? We also played CLUE. The kids couldn't say anything except in Spanish, and although the kids were pretty quiet for a while, they couldn't stay that way for the entire game and soon the Spanish was flowing.
I am always looking for new ideas and activities, and I am always looking for ways to improve. For all my new readers, please add comments, send me an email. If there is one thing all the research has shown me is that teachers need to work together toward the common goal......creating thinkers, not just passing out diplomas.
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