- To what extent do you think you have achieved each of the learning outcomes for Week 2? If you think there is room for you to achieve these more fully, what could you do to achieve that?
The content in this week-flipped classroom- has enriched me in blended e-learning. This week the focus of our study was on the flipped classroom. I am satisfied with the content shared in the digital resources to a large extent. My basics regarding a flip classroom were developed. I have started innovative approaches and strategies of a flipped classroom in my classroom. In a flipped classroomI increased the inquisition of students by providing activities to them at home (Little, A., & Pegler, C. 2007). Creativity in the right direction helped me learning this course.
- What have you learned this week regarding the use of flipped classroom approaches to support student learning?
We allocate time for activities so that students get involved in the learning process. When students watch videos at home then there comes questions in their mind. The idea of flipped classs room is to evolve question in the mind of the students. When the students come to class, they have some confusions in their mind, which arised due to the non- availability of the answers. The teacher asks preemptive questions in the class. Those students who have watched the videos or powerpoint slides will be able to answer the questions to some extent. Those students who have not watched the videos, will feel the peer pressure and will be compelled to watch it, the very next time.In this way, they will become a responsible student. So, in flipped classroom, a student knows about the topic before he/she actually comes to the class onsite. The time in this method is employed in group discussion. So, the level of learning goes beyond the simple lecture method. This is a pure student centered approach with the option of teacher facilitation (John, A.L., & Pegler, C. 2007).
- What does all this suggest about the ways you and your colleagues are currently supporting your students’ learning, in your own practice and teaching context? What is good about these, and how could they be further developed in the future?
We learned different new terms like concept map, learning design sequence, story board etc. The whole story of flipped classroom is a great novel idea for us. The way knowledge is presented in the digital resource books, is captivating, and fueling our hunger of knowledge. This week’s effort was a superb one. It enhanced our knowledge.We are planning to apply flipped classroom’s method of teaching, in our classrooms, which is a change in our teaching methodology.
As, research is an ongoing phenomena, so the start of right mix of number of technology should be confirmed with students. The more it is student friendly, the more it is effective (John, A.L., & Pegler, C. 2007).
- How has your understanding of the use of flipped classroom approaches changed from doing this week’s topic and activities?
Flipped classroom is the method of future learning. I have heared about it, but to conduct a flip classroom session, is new to me. Learning about the pros and cons, of this teaching method, has transformed my thinking, about blended e-learning process, as a viable process and need of the time. I thought it, as a non-applicable research process, due to ignorance but it actually equips a teacher, to transform a class into a student-centered classroom and transform a teacher’s role from a knowledge disseminator to a problem solver. I shifted the role of student from passive to active listener. The student is supposed to vist class for discussing problems, rather than coming only for listening the lecture passively (Macdonald, J. 2008).
- How did you learn this?
I learned this week from official digital resources books, group discussion. The books played a pivotal role in making my view point about this course. Little john book is a master piece in blended e learning (Littlejohn, A. & Pegler, C. 2007). Gilly’s book provided the minute details required in this topic (Salmon, G. 2008). I feeled knowledgeful by reading stein’s book (Stein, J. & Graham, C. 2014).
I also watched webinar available on the forum. I watched question answer session, and it helped me a lot, in preparing my CRJ. I learned course by empathizing and visualizing the current scenario and imagining the needs of the present time. Group discussion was critical in learning this course. Rigorous reading was a crucial element in gaining knowledge.
- What supported your learning?
All the material given to me on digital resource supported me in making this CRJ. The idea of thinking out of the box helped me. I endorse this idea of flipped learning because it is a double profit formula for teachers because students learn from level two and three of bloom’s learning, instead of starting from step one. The first step is knowledge attainment. Then comes comprehension and application (Bloom,1956).
This idea is possible for daring teachers, who can answer the questions and can manage chaos in the class, which comes from loaded questions as a result of yesterday’s video. So, the daring nature of flipped classroom attracted me.
- What has challenged you?
It is imperative for students to have state of the art facilities to participate in this online blended e-learning sessions.
Avoiding student’s lurking is a psychological quiz for the teacher. Such students avoid posting comments and shy to comment. It is achallenge to keep students tuned to the online learning task rather than indulging in social media entertainment forums. Online forums like youtube, are so distracting, that a student may go from learning video to entertainment videos. The choices of e-learning design are so many, that he may feel stand still on amount of choices. (John,A.L., & Pegler,C. 2007)
The depth and intensity of discussion, is a challenge in a flipped classroom. Students participation, in the contemporary online debate, is an enormous task. It can be tackled with asynchronously. The liberty of student can be maintained with the following method. Onsite class participation within a group in a challenging task in this method. Organizing online sessions may get random messages which disturbs time management but can be handled with time limits (Salman, G. 2013) .
Some teachers fear to experiment with flipped classroom method due to the fear of failure. This is a great challenge, for teachers to be confident for innovation (LittleJohn et all.,2003).
- What has surprised you?
Some students don’t want to participate in online sessions and want to benefit from other’s discussion. This habbit surprises me.This is a behavior, that I am astonished to read at. I did not study it before this course. It is surprising to know, that icebreaking activity, like survey or other valueable feedback, is required during online session, to keep the student’s interest going. There are various types of blendings. Time, space and media blendings. All is required that there should be a careful consideration in organizing the course (John,A.L., & Pegler,C. 2007).
- How does this relate to what has been proposed in the different sources of scholarship you have read? Which specific sources and what claims in those does this relate to?
These learning tasks will be considered successful, if the students consider them relevant, effective and applicable. This is possible when the forum is structured and managed and the learners are given proper support (Conole et all., 2004).
The whole idea of flipped classroom is strongly agreeable, with the concept of blended e- learning. All the portions, of flipped class room, with their divergences and convergences, fall within the category of blended e-learning. Good design process, can create a high quality and explicit activity in the class. The optimal results, lies in the hands of management of e-learning courses (Conole,2004).