Tuesday, July 7, 2015

Flippin' awesome teaching for a new generation




Yesterday I attended the Burnside Learning Community Cluster un-conference. Held on the first day of the holidays, many teachers and support staff came together from almost all of the early childhood, primary and secondary schools in our cluster to network, share ideas and to learn.

The keynote by Dr Cheryl Doig from Think Beyond was called 'Into the Future' and raised some excellent points about the changes education is facing. I went on to several different breakouts afterwards but one particularly grabbed my attention. I went to see a secondary science teacher, @mattynicoll and his breakout called 'Rewind Learning' (see the video above of another time he has shared this presentation online).

I have been interested in flipped learning for a few years now but I was excited to see and hear examples in my own backyard. I first heard about a teacher at Breens Intermediate doing some cool things, just starting off by recording himself & posting it to his YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/user/mrmteacherbreens.

This is exactly how Matt described his beginning too and that he just had to push past the fear of looking/sounding silly and embrace the possibilities that posting learning activities online would offer his students. Allowing kids to watch the video at their own pace, watch it after school hours, rewind and watch over and over, watch it before or after the actual physical lesson at school and to share it with others who might also have an interest in it and could work together with you on the concept is just a few of the awesome benefits to recording and sharing lesson content online. Matt's YouTube channel is also an awesome resource https://www.youtube.com/user/mattynicoll and its very cool to see just how well the lesson have developed and grown in quality and confidence!

The concept of flipping the classroom sounds time consuming and challenging at its most complex but what I got from listening to Matt share his experiences, is that you can take it at your own pace, to a level that you are comfortable with. All you have to do is give it a go, try something new, be innovative, take risks, step outside your comfort zone...you know, all the stuff we ask our students to do!

But don't take my word for it, I am by no means an expert. If it's an experts opinion you are after though, perhaps take a listen to this guy, one of my all time favs!


Michael Fullan: Technology, the new pedagogy and flipped teaching



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