The authors provide a brief conceptual framework for Flipped Learning and describe a program designed to equip teachers with the tools and support for trying it in their classrooms.
Introduction
One of the great challenges facing those who want to learn about Flipped Learning is that there is no single definition for it and it encompasses a variety of different possibilities. At its core Flipped Learning involves “offloading” some of the direct instruction which usually takes place in the classroom to video. This single innovation has multiple applications and benefits. Let us examine three alternate possibilities this generates: pre-class, post-class, in-class.
As a pre-class activity, it enables the teacher to prime students with content that they will have been exposed to before the class begins. When students walk into the class they will have prior knowledge upon which the teacher can build. At a fundamental level this is not radically different from what teachers have been doing for a long time, assigning pre-class readings to facilitate more productive discussions in class. The use of video opens the possibility for audio and visual learners to gain entry to the content, and the ready accessibility means that students can watch the video when and where it is convenient for them, even on their phones. Of course, any student who needs to hear the material repeated can easily replay it multiple times, eliminating much of the challenges posed by students who need things repeated multiple times in class.
Often, the content of the video will be the material that students may have a hard time sitting through in class, the kind of cognition on the lower scales of Bloom’s taxonomy. In-class presentation is a poor use of teacher time and often generates friction in the teacher-student relationship. Moving this content out of class enables the teacher to focus class time on higher level processing. Thus, many of the leaders in Flipped Learning describe the process as flipping Bloom’s taxonomy: homework focuses on lower level thinking which comes easier to students and for which they need less adult intervention while classwork focuses on higher level processing for which the teacher (rather than the parent) is most valuable.
One twist on the pre-class activity requires students to answer a simple online questionnaire either during or following the video. The teacher receives input from the students well before class begins, and can tailor the lesson to address areas of confusion if necessary. Of course, this enables the teacher to easily differentiate for different students without having to guess what they need to work on.
As a post-class activity, videos allow for easy review of essential content. Many students find this valuable, particularly when learning complex content. They may understand it initially in class only to realize that they lost the train of thought when they got home. Having a review video is extremely valuable.
As an in-class tool the videos can become a valuable resource for students doing independent learning. Imagine, for example, a skills-based Humash class in which students are expected to work with texts by themselves or with a hevruta. The teacher can introduce short videos describing how to use a dictionary or concordance, or have a library of videos explaining how to parse the verb root and determine the specific conjugated meaning through the prefixes and suffixes. Students who are stuck at any given point can access the library to remind themselves of their skills, freeing the teacher to help students who are struggling, provide enrichment for students who are excelling, and prod the individual/groups – each at their own pace.
Fundamentally, then, Flipped Learning transforms the teacher’s role from being the source of information to the facilitator of learning. The teacher’s energies shift from trying to control the class to maximizing the learning of the students as individuals and as a group.
Flipping Jewish studies
Flipped Learning has been around for a little more than a decade and began to gain widespread traction and attention in the last five years. There is a growing body of research literature attempting to define it, explore its possibilities, and assess its efficacy. (See, for example, the report at http://tinyurl.com/lllm9yy and the practical guides at http://blog.peerinstruction.net/.) Flipped Learning has been tried at every grade level, from Kindergarten to college, and in subjects as diverse as learning letters to European history to literature, chemistry and college physics. One area which has been underexplored is the application of Flipped Learning to Jewish studies.
With funding provided by an ignition grant from the UJA/ Federation of NY, in 2013 The Lookstein Center launched a program to explore Flipped Learning in Jewish studies. Sixteen teachers from twelve schools (all in the NY area) were selected to participate in the first year of the program. The teachers include men and women with a range of educational backgrounds, teaching from grades 2 through high school, and working in schools from a broad slice of the religious spectrum.
The teachers meet at regular intervals to share their successes and challenges, to learn new tools, and to hear from leading practitioners of Flipped Learning. Some teachers have introduced Flipped Learning to teach elementary Hebrew grammar, others are using it to teach middle and high school Talmud, while others have completely transformed their teaching of Humash and Jewish history. A number of teachers have even experimented with showing the videos in class.
One of the things the participants quickly discovered was that producing a high quality video was extraordinarily time-consuming, but that there was no need to produce slick videos. Short, explanatory pieces, without fancy graphics were just fine. One teacher reported that he initially spent two hours producing a ten-minute video, but after a short while successfully recorded a slightly less-perfect but no less-effective version in under a half hour.
A mid-year survey revealed a number of interesting things about the ways that these teachers were using the videos. Half of the teachers were using videos at least once every other week. Morethan three-quarters of the teachers described the value added in using Flipped Learning as enhancing student engagement and increased student comprehension, more than half reported that it enabled them to teach more efficiently, while smaller percentages indicated that it was effective in differentiation, increasing the number of students able to meet the learning expectations, and increased teacher-student time. Some teachers were using the videos primarily for review while others saw the videos as opening up doors to changing the way they think about their roles as teachers.
One important outcome of this program is a website being developed by The Lookstein Center which will host all the videos produced, and will eventually become a central exchange for teachers who wish to explore. Videos will be tagged and searchable.
What we have learned so far
One of the questions people ask most often is, “What will the students do in class after they learned the main idea at home?” The teachers in this program asked the same question and were surprised at the range of ideas they were able to generate – including review, application, analysis, and independent exploration. Students walk into class with a sense of being empowered because they are already familiar with the content, enabling greater participation and richer discussions.
We have also learned that short videos, even a series of them, are more effective than longer ones (longer ones can be broken into smaller segments, called “chunking”), and that while videos need not be entertaining the more successful ones use the same kind of techniques that the teacher uses to make classroom time engaging. Further, we learned that having the students respond to the videos immediately (there are some software packages that do not allow the video to continue unless the students respond to certain questions) greatly increases students’ preparedness to do their assignment and their connectivity to the material being studied.
In addition, from the students we have learned that videos we consider boring are sometimes the most helpful to students. They can concentrate on the content and not be distracted by fancy, fast moving graphics found on commercial-grade videos. Finally, we again get confirmation of how important it is for students to be empowered and gain some control over their learning process.
Reactions from teachers
When we asked teachers to reflect on their experiences with Flipped Learning there were, predictably, a range of responses. These include comments such as:
- It has increased efficiency.
- When a video lesson is prepared correctly, it can engage the students in ways you cannot accomplish easily in class. I feel that for my students, they gain a lot by watching a presentation outside the classroom, since they are challenged to watch without asking immediate questions to a teacher. This forces the student to pay more careful attention. This fosters better understanding from the student, but the video lesson must be clear. It also allows the teacher to teach more efficiently, since he/she can now take the time to focus on different aspects of the material.
- Students generally seem to enjoy watching them and feel like they are better able to spend the time they need on learning what they want to learn without having to worry about how that affects the rest of the class.
- The kids really like it, it helps them and it really saves class time because I don’t have to repeat too many times.
- … in anticipation of my next Torah study unit I hit on something that in the past I designed as a mini-lesson, but I can do it much more thoroughly and more interestingly with a video.
- After this experience, I can’t imagine going back to my old way of teaching and not using “active learning” methodologies in my classroom. This type of teaching is so much more effective.
- As a Chumash teacher of both a lower level and higher level class I can say that both classes are benefitting from the flipped classroom model in different ways. The advanced class finds the videos productive because it gives them the opportunity to analyze the information on a deeper level in class. The basics are covered at home and consequently the class time can be used to take the material to the next level. I strongly believe that the flipped model has enhanced the learning of the lower level class in so many ways. These students have a harder time paying attention and can learn the information more quickly when they see and hear it. In addition, they can watch the video as many times as they wish without anyone knowing. Most importantly, the students feel extremely empowered the next day in class. The information is not new to them.
Conclusion
Flipped Learning is not a panacea. Introducing a video will not transform a weak teacher into a strong one. But Flipped Learning can be a valuable tool in the hands of a skilled educator, and the methodology opens up new possibilities for maintaining focus, content delivery, teacher-student interactions, self-paced learning, differentiation, and student motivation. It can help good teachers become better and it can help students become more engaged and better learners.