Welcome to the Flipping Family.
We’re high school teachers (well, one of us mostly teaches junior high). We’re all different ages and in different stages of our teaching careers. We teach reading and ‘riting and ‘rithmatic, with Spanish and Art classes thrown in for good measure. Each of us are flipping one or more of our classes. And in the midst of all this learning and flipping, we’ve become a family. Because I’m the oldest and the “Mom” of the group, I get to introduce this blog and myself.
As with all things education in my life the last couple of years, this endeavor started on Twitter.
A tweet about something called a “flipped classroom.”
An article describing it.
I tweeted Libby (#responsiblemiddlechild), “This sounds like us. I want to try it.”
#Bossman tweeted us back and said “If you want to know more about this, I’ve got a place to send you.” (You’ve got to love a bossman who pays attention to your tweets AND responds to them in this way.)
Tanya, the #oldestchild joined in. She was interested too. (She was more blended and flipped than she thought)
So we began reading and learning. We visited a school. We talked, we tweeted, we talked some more.
Little by little we tried things.
Then, #theoops joined our staff. He went along with us to a conference. As with many youngest children, he wasn’t going to be left behind. He jumped right in and tried it (maybe a little need for attention). Then #youngestsister joined our staff. She liked the idea and joined our merry little family.
We are lucky that our district is giving us personal learning time during inservices. We all work together in a Personal Learning Community (PLC). We talk. We disagree. We share. We reflect.
Hence, this blog.
This is my 24th year in our district. I began as a paraprofessional in the Special Ed department (You have to start somewhere! It was a great boost to my teaching skills). I taught junior high for fourteen or fifteen years---English, Reading, and Advanced English. Then, I moved to the high school. Now I teach Speech, Drama, Creative Writing and English 9 and coach contest Speech (Forensics).
So why did I want to flip?
I know that in many ways, my teaching has incorporated the tenets of flipped learning. I have always wanted my students to take charge of their learning. I want them to think (My favorite part of my day? When a student says, “Mrs. Day, this is hard.”). I want them to solve their own problems. I want them to share what they know with others. I want them to reflect on their learning.
I don’t want to lecture.
Has flipping Creative Writing been easy?
Nope. Sometimes I’m not really sure how to do this. Sometimes, what works in other areas doesn’t seem to fit with my Creative Writing class. If you look at my website, there are gaps in the lessons (I’ll get them filled this semester, though. Don’t you worry about that!).
I’m still not fully flipping as I write this. I might not ever fully flip writing. (Mostly because I like to write with my kids). But there are lots of parts of writing I can flip. And that’s where I’m headed.
Is it a blended flip? Hybrid flip? Crappy flip? Not a flip?
Call it what you want. I want my kids to find answers for themselves. I want them to use me as a resource and a mentor. I want them to come to my class each day and say, “You shared with me how you do this. Now, I want to try it on my own.”
I want them to own their learning.
Simple as that.
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