Flipping Your English Class to Reach All Learners

Strategies and Lesson Plans

Troy Cockrum

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781317821021
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education Technology

Learn how flipping your English language arts classroom can help you reach students of different abilities, improve classroom management, and give you more time to interact with each student. This practical book shows why flipped classrooms are effective and how they work. You will find out how to flip your instruction in writing, reading, language, and speaking and listening while meeting the Common Core State Standards. A variety of step-by-step lesson plans are provided.

Chapter 1
Why I Flipped My Class

I was distraught. I had found myself in that troublesome spot where many other teachers—maybe even you—have been before. I was just into my fourth year of teaching and was on the verge of quitting the profession. I was teaching middle school language arts and felt like I spent endless hours grading papers, managing classroom behavior and staff meetings, and trying to find ways to encourage students to meet certain standardized expectations. I realized these various tasks are part of a teaching career. The issue wasn’t so much that I minded doing them. It was more problematic that I wasn’t seeing the learning results. I wasn’t seeing my students achieve those “Aha!” moments we teachers so tirelessly work to get. I was passionate about student learning and it seemed I spent more time focused on student accountability.

I continually asked myself the question, “What is the best use of my class time with my students?” I knew individualized instruction was essential for quality learning. But how could I achieve that with 25 or more students in a class? I knew that being able to guide students’ specific questions while they were working on an assignment was important to their success. But how could I be available to all my students when they were working and creating? Many teachers, having 50–150 students or more, even if they made themselves available via e-mail, could spend hours of their personal time answering all their students’ questions. I knew that I wanted my students to do more high-order thinking and to be creative. I wanted to teach problem solving, critical thinking, and collaboration, but how could I find the time? How could I challenge the higher-achieving students to go deeper without at the same time ignoring or discouraging the lower-achieving students? How could I support students at their pace while still meeting all the standards the teaching field required? How could I encourage students to guide their own learning when I had so many of them to assess for standards? In short, how could I create a personalized learning environment for each student so that all of the students could grow and develop to the best of their ability? All these questions were answered, to my surprise, by the Flipped Classroom.

Now, I’ll be honest. The first question I had hoped to answer with Flipped Learning was: how could I gain more class time to cover the material I needed to cover? That is what originally drew me to Flipped Learning. Answering all these questions kept me using Flipped Learning and brought me to where I am today, which will probably not be the same place six months from now. Flipped Learning is a process that consistently improves you and allows you to do things in your class you never had time for before. It’s like a spouse who constantly demands you be a better person. Flipped Learning constantly demands you be a better teacher.

Let me back up a little. My journey into Flipped Learning started before I made the actual decision to flip my class. Prior to 2010, I had been gradually introducing more technology to my classroom. One piece this year, another piece the next. It was a very hodgepodge approach with little consistency. I’d hear about a great Web site or online tool and jump on it. I didn’t put a lot of thought into how technology supported learning; I was just enamored with the tool. Then, I decided one of my strengths as a teacher could be my ability to infuse the curriculum with technology in an organized, meaningful way. I worked formerly in the mass media industry and was required to continually learn and be on the cutting edge of technology. I was stupefied to come into the classroom and see such an aversion to technology in a lot of areas of education, from the classroom to professional development. Whether it be because of fear or budgets, technology was not at the forefront for a lot of education professionals. I decided to take the leap to more technology by cannon balling in and stopping the piecemeal, disorganized way I had utilized it in the past. However, you don’t need to be particularly innovative in your use of technology to flip your class; you just need to be willing to step out of your comfort zone and learn. As with any teaching method, reflection of practice is a key component for a successful flipped class.

I already used the Writing Workshop model (discussed more in Chapter 4). I started using that in 2008 because I saw the value of working with students in the classroom. But it wasn’t quite meeting all my needs. Then I read The Digital Writing Workshop by Troy Hicks and got inspired to forge forward (2009). In November of that year, I attended the NCTE convention in Orlando for the first time. One of the biggest highlights happened on day one when I saw Troy Hicks, Bud Hunt, and Sarah Kajder present a session titled Creating Opportunities for Learning with Newer Literacies and Technologies: Three Reports from Cyberspace (2010). Hearing these speakers not only gave me great ideas and inspiration to bring into my classroom, it also validated my decisions on the uses of technology and the importance of building twenty-first-century skills with my students. If you’re reading this book, you probably agree.

Later during that conference, I stumbled into a session called Using Google in Ways That Haven’t Even Been Invented Yet: Visionary Reports from Cyberspace (Zellner & Beauchamp-Hicks, 2009). In this session, I watched Andrea Zellner, Sara Beauchamp-Hicks, and, again, Troy Hicks talk about their uses of Google Apps™ for Education. I sat in that session seeing small snippets of what these teachers could do and said to myself, “I want to do that.” Their presentation inspired me to not only use Google in my class a lot more, it also inspired me to attempt to become a Google Certified Teacher. I was fortunate to be accepted into the Google Teacher Academy a year and a half later. It probably seems like I’m rambling here. “What does this have to do with flipping?” you may be asking. Well, I bring up my Google experiences because that is when I first met Ramsey Musallam, who has greatly influenced my views on how my Flipped Classroom currently operates.

As my teaching and technology infusion progressed, I came across the concept known as the Flipped Classroom sometime in December 2010. I saw a video made by TechSmith on YouTube™ (http://www.youtube/2H4RkudFzlc) of Aaron Sams talking about his Flipped Classroom. A friend of mine who taught middle school math had been looking for ways to differentiate his classroom, and I passed this video on to him as a suggestion. He got very excited about trying it for a variety of reasons and began asking me questions since he believed the model sounded very similar to what I was already doing. It was at some point during those discussions, and after subsequent research, that I realized I could blend the flipped model with the workshop model and buy myself more in-class work time while still delivering the necessary content that would have been in the mini-lessons. And that was the birth of my foray into Flipped Learning.

As I researched more during that semester, I followed the Flipped Classroom Ning (flippedlearning.org), and came across the Flipped Classroom Conference (now known as FlipCon) in Woodland Park, Colorado put on by Jon Bergmann and Aaron Sams. On a whim, not really expecting to get it approved, I showed it to my principal (including all associated costs), and to my surprise he said, “Sounds great. Go for it!”

Attending the conference was the best decision I could have made because when I decided to go, I still wasn’t fully sure I wanted to flip. I absorbed so much information from Jon Bergmann, Aaron Sams, Brian Bennett, April Gudenrath, Jason Kern, and several others at the conference. I saw the passion these educators brought to their classrooms. I saw the nuts and bolts of making it work. It brought a great deal of clarity and confidence to the potential of this model.

At the time, I hadn’t found another English teacher doing the Flipped Classroom the way I wanted to do it. I hardly met any English teachers doing it at all. I met April Gudenrath, a high school English teacher from Colorado Springs, at the conference and, although I had a different concept of how I wanted to flip my class, I got some ideas from her. We have since collaborated on several projects related to Flipped Learning. When I made that decision to begin flipping my English class starting that next school year, there was no way I could fathom the transformative experience to my teaching that was about to happen.

I have learned a lot of lessons about Flipped Learning during the past few years, some by trial and error and some by connecting with any Flipped Learning teacher I could find. Below is a list of some valuable insights I came across. This list is by no means exhaustive, nor in order of importance, but represents the main reasons I continue to flip.

Flipping Benefits Students of All Abilities

With the Flipped Classroom, I can give struggling students ample attention and assessment to meet their needs. I have the flexibility to give alternate assessments on an individualized level. I have the extra time needed to talk with these students and help them where they are struggling. If they are behind grade level, I can easily modify assignments or teach/reteach missing content. These students also don’t feel the embarrassment of being asked to answer questions in front of the class when they don’t know the answer, or the embarrassment of having to ask a question in front of the class, when, in their mind, everyone else gets it.

And I wasn’t the only one seeing these results. Because of the success Clinton-dale High School in Michigan was experiencing from flipping its math program, in 2010, it made the decision to flip all its ninth grade classes, including language arts. By the end of that first semester, it saw a 33% drop in failure rates in ELA classes. Even more impressive, by the end of the second year of flipping, students scored 28% higher in writing and 34% higher in reading on the Michigan Merit Exam (Green, 2012).

Struggling students aren’t the only students to benefit. One of the first reactions I noticed was the apprehensiveness of my higher-ability students when learning about the Flipped Classroom. These students had success in the old, traditional model and worried they wouldn’t continue that success. For many of them, success meant they got As and Bs. However, they quickly saw that not only could I challenge them to go further as students, I could offer them the support they needed to take risks, to go deeper, or to explore a problem further than they ever had. Previously, these students rarely got academic attention from their teachers. Their work was completed well and, even if it exceeded expectations, was marked or given feedback based on the expectation of all students. Now, I could challenge these students to go beyond the grade-level standard. Prior to flipping, I often had students who were very creative and talented writers or readers to whom I couldn’t give the time to individualize their feedback. With flipping, I can. I can now have individual discussions with these students and challenge or affirm their observations about a book we’re reading. I can challenge them to evaluate their own writing on a higher level. Seventh grader Tanner observed, “When I first heard about the flipped class, I was very skeptical. I had never had a Flipped Classroom before, and I was worried that it was going to be a lot harder than a normal classroom.” However, his final evaluation said, “I currently enjoy having the flipped classroom. It gives me a lot more freedom about what I work on during the week. I like it because we can easily get help from Mr. Cockrum while we are working on it in class instead of emailing him or waiting until the next day to ask him.”

Flipping Helps Students Become More Responsible for Their Own Learning

Flipping your classroom allows you the opportunity to make your classroom more student centered. With the ability to pace themselves, my students became more responsible for their own learning. They not only developed skills in time management by organizing their own daily and weekly schedule, they also were encouraged and supported in finding ways to personalize their learning. Traditional schooling has made students believe they must conform to certain requirements to show learning. When I am able to assess all students individually, they realize that learning is the most important goal, not just being able to fill in the blank correctly. When students realize that the learning is what is being evaluated and not whether they completed a checklist of items, they feel empowered to take control of their own learning.

Flipping Benefits Busy Students

In my classroom, flipping has allowed me to offer multiple assignments in advance. It also allows my students the ability to complete most, if not all, of their work in class. Busy students love being able to control the amount of homework they have. I have a student, Myra, who is a high-level gymnast, and her evenings and weekends are pretty full. She checks with me at the beginning and end of every week to confirm all current and upcoming assignments. She is then able to use her class time efficiently to complete her work in class. She said in her end-of-year survey, “My favorite part of using the Flipped Classroom in English was that I was able to completely manage my work. I could watch videos ahead of classes, and then get ahead if I had lots of activities on a certain day. It helped ease up my schedule and I felt like I was pretty on top of things.” Even the students who aren’t busy appreciate being able to minimize or even eliminate homework.

Flipping Allows Teachers More Individual Interaction with Every Student

The biggest benefit of flipping, and the reason I am able to easily individualize or differentiate my instruction, is that I have significantly more interaction time with every student. As Bergmann and Sams often note, in a Flipped Classroom, the teacher can “reach every student in every class every day.” In a recent Speak Up survey, nearly 60% of students in grades 6–12 agreed with the statement that Flipped Learning “would be a good way for me to learn” (Project Tomorrow, 2013). I make a priority of having a conversation with each student even if it is not about anything academic. And that individual interaction leads to the next point. Flipped Classrooms are really about relationships.

Flipping Allows Teachers the Ability to Develop Better Relationships with All Their Students

One of my favorite benefits of the Flipped Classroom is that the amount of individual interaction I get with each student almost instantly creates better relationships with each student. All students want attention, whether they admit it or not. The Flipped Classroom allows me to give all my students individual positive attention. I don’t think many people can argue that putting in valuable time talking with each student will not pay major dividends on learning.

Many flipped teachers and students report the same benefit. In a survey of educators and students across the United States, close to 80% of students and 90% of teachers said that positive interactions between teachers and students have increased because of flipping their class (Driscoll, 2012). If this was the only benefit that came from Flipped Learning, it would still be more than worth the time invested. I get to have amazing conversations with my students. I find out their likes and dislikes. I get to know them as people, and not just students that sit in my classroom. This is what I got into teaching to do.

Flipping Significantly Reduces Negative Behaviors that Affect Classroom Management

As I mentioned earlier, prior to flipping, I felt I was spending a great deal of time tackling classroom management and classroom behavior issues. Admittedly, I wasn’t good at behavior management in the classroom. I went to several conferences and tried different methods, but still felt I was falling short. Now, I don’t have nearly the behavior issues in my classroom. The students who interrupted class because they were craving attention no longer have an audience. Students who were bored now have challenging activities to fill the class time. Students who felt inadequate because they didn’t understand the material now get the help they need. Clintondale High School saw a 74% decrease in student discipline cases during the first two years of flipping all its classes (Green, 2012).

I’ll be honest—not all behavior issues magically disappear. However, when a problem arises, I can now deal with that problem individually rather than having to figure out how to manage the classroom while at the same time addressing the unwelcome behavior. And many times, an individual discussion easily solves the problem.

Flipping Is Not About the Video

Finally, many Flipped Classroom proponents will tell you, “It is not about the video.” Well, what does that mean exactly? The majority of new flippers focus much of their attention on creating videos. The content creation process quite possibly generates the highest amount of stress for many teachers. If you’ve just made the decision to flip or are still considering flipping, you may have some anxiety about creating videos. I get that. Later in this book, I’ll give you details on creating videos and some tools to do that. However...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Meet the Author
• Acknowledgments
• 1 Why I Flipped My Class
• 2 What Is a Flipped Classroom?
• 3 Why a Flipped Class Works in Language Arts
• 4 Models of a Flipped Classroom
• 5 Flipped Writing Instruction
• 6 Flipped Language Instruction
• 7 Flipped Reading Instruction
• 8 Flipping Speaking and Listening Instruction
• 9 Other Uses for Flipping Language Arts
• 10 Tips for Making Engaging Videos
• 11 FAQs and Resources
• Conclusion
• References