My Flipped Classroom, Part 2

It has been two months in my flipped classrooms and I think it is a good time to reflect on how this new perspective has impacted both my students and myself.  In this post, I will reflect upon AP Biology and in my next post I will share how Honors Biology is going and how I use portfolios to aid that particular flip.

The “flip” in Advanced Placement Biology suffered a bit of a hit about 3 weeks into school.  Looking back, however, it was the best thing to happen to me, though at the time I felt like the worst teacher in the world.  I was so gung-ho over the idea of the flipped classroom that I went nearly 100% with it right away.  The students were assigned chapters and videos to complete on their own at night in order to have time in class to do discussion and in-depth activities that applied their “already learned” knowledge.  While I thought students were spending an hour each night with the material, it turned out they were spending twice that and still felt unable to keep pace with the material (about 2 chapters/week).  Needless to say, they were extremely overwhelmed and not truly learning the material at all.  Fortunately, through much reflecting, I was able to adjust and now use the “flip” about 50% of the time.  I realize that there are concepts that do need direct instruction at this advanced level and pacing, and other concepts that can be assigned for review by the students (i.e. mitosis).  The students still watch videos and we still do in class discussions, but there are times where I “lecture”.  I put quotes around this term, because I no longer lecture in the traditional sense.  Through this new “flipped” model, my whole perspective on my role as the teacher has changed drastically.  Even though I am in front of the room, I by no means deliver the material to them.  Instead, I challenge them – ask probing questions, force them to make connections to previous chapters, and frequently group them during this “lecture” time to repeat important concepts to one another.  They cannot sit idly by as I drone on and on as I did in previous years.  This new perspective has added immense energy to this class and the students enjoy themselves.  It has also provided a bit more time for lab analysis – an important skill both for the AP test and for their college futures.  Most of all, though, the students have slowly taken charge of their learning because I have forced them to.  I am learning to challenge them without overwhelming them – a difficult balance to attain. 

How do I know that students are taking charge of their learning?  I have seen a huge increase in students emailing me with questions, coming in early, and staying late to get extra help.  I have also heard that many get together on weekends to study and do labs with one another.  I have somehow managed to get them to see that this is THEIR class and not MY class.  Additionally, I have hopefully made the classroom environment conducive to actually learning instead of just achieving high grades.  I am allowing quiz retakes and test corrections this year – something I never did in the past.  Now that the focus and responsibility is put on them, I feel it only right to give them the opportunity to correct their mistakes and learn from them.  A poor test grade does not help a student in any way.  But coming in early, going over their test with me, and then making corrections will hopefully increase their learning of those topics.

Some of you may be reading this (thanks for getting this far!) and thinking, “how is this “flipped” teaching any different than other good teaching methods?”  TAKE HOME MESSAGE FROM ME: IT’S NOT ANY DIFFERENT!!!!  I, personally, have become a better teacher because of my flip, but the flip is certainly not a prerequisite for great teaching.  There recently have been many naysayers on the flip (another post entirely), and one criticism is good teaching is still good teaching, so why should teachers go through the trouble of flipping their classrooms?  I agree!  For me, it was a perspective change – the flip was simply a vehicle that allowed me to put the learning back into the students’ hands and transform myself into their learning guide instead of their disseminator of information.

To sum it up, I finally feel like I am teaching the AP Biology that I want to teach instead of the class that the College Board tells me to teach.   The great Kim Foglia once told our listserve that students will learn best when we teach the class WE want to teach – as far as both material and methods.  AP Bio is the reason I got into science in high school and it is my favorite course to teach – now my students see and feel that passion through my videos, our discussions, and the manner in which I challenge them daily to “make connections” to the world around them.