A lot of people, much smarter than I am, have been writing what it means to be flipped, and some other people (also smarter than me) have questioned whether or not what we're doing can even be called flipped.

Naming something, defining it, is a way of understanding.  We give things names so we can catagorise, analyse, interpret.  It's natural, and it's helpful.  

But what happens when something changes, expands, grows, and the definition no longer is quite right?  Do we come up with a new term?  Do we become more strict with the definition so as to be more clear?  

Or do we expand that term so that, rather than constricting our understanding, it widens it and allows for more people to come inside and be included.

That, more than anything, defines flipped learning for me: inclusive.

When I happened upon flipped learning at this time last year, I didn't see how I could fit in.  My students were poor, they lacked internet at home, and I had no way of recording video.  Oh yeah, and all the models out there were for math and science, and I taught English.

But there was something about flipped learning that caught my attention.  In a school where direct instruction was mandated and commonplace - almost part of the DNA - it seemed like something that would both please my administrators AND help my students learn.  I could do direct instruction but I could also spend more time helping my students get better at reading, writing, listening and speaking.

It seemed like the perfect solution in many ways.  

So I went looking for a way to make it work.  My district Ed Tech director got me an iPad so I could make my own videos.  I polled my students, and only three of them didn't have a smartphone or a computer with internet access at home (this was in a 90% SED school).  I arranged for those three students to use my devices during break, lunch or before/after school.  So I made some videos with the week's etymology lesson, assigned them as homework, and used the time we would have spent copying the notes practicing with the content, doing real-life examples, and playing memory games.  Test scores on the weekly quizzes went up, and I was confident I was on to something.

Then that same Ed Tech director pitched Twitter to us.  And I was Not Interested.  At all.

For a few days.  Finally, I just asked my students to teach me Twitter and help me get started.  They were happy to oblige.

Very quickly, I was hooked.  And that's also when I discovered that there was so much more to flipped learning than I had ever expected.  

I joined the #flipclass Monday chats (which now I help moderate semi-regularly).

I started blogging and sharing my posts on Twitter (which may be where you found this post).

I had conversations with some of the people I had read about - Brian Bennett, Crystal Kirch, Troy Cockrum, Jon Bergmann, Aaron Sams - and they all helped to push my thinking on various issues.  Many have now become my close friends.

That's how, within six weeks of flipping, I transitioned from "Flip 101" (assigning videos as HW and former homework as classwork) to something that I still saw as flipped, but wasn't the same as how many of my colleagues flipped their class.

My classroom quickly became mastery-based, paperless, self-paced and homework free.  I still made videos, I still used many of the same tools as my Flip 101 colleagues...

...and I still tweeted to the same hashtag.

Flipping my class no longer was my goal.  I was flipped.  Instead, my goal was to make my flipped class the best possible place for MY students, in MY context.  I started to view flipped learning as a place where students had ownership (responsibility was flipped to them from me) and where I used technology to help them learn best.   Later, I moved to defining flipped learning by the Flipped Mindset - a definition developed by several collaborators on Twitter.

Now, a year into my flipped journey, my classroom looks different than it did last fall, last spring, or even at the beginning of this school year.  

I have what I like to call my CoLab partner, Andrew Thomasson.  He helps me plan all of my instruction, prepares for and films video lessons with me, and encourages me to be a reflective practitioner, a good flipped teacher, and a better friend.  I'm at a new school and operate with a BYOD policy and open wifi network.  My students are much higher skilled, and require far less direct instruction (almost none).  I don't assign homework, and don't always use video.  I've stepped away from self-pacing and paperless (without 1:1 netbooks, that's a lot harder) and embraced a far more student-centred pedagogy that focuses on higher-order thinking skills and real-life application of concepts.

There are many people who would say I'm not flipped.

And I would argue, just as vehemently, that I am.

**

When Romeo asked himself, "what's in a name?" I doubt he was thinking about its application to the flipped class community.  Nevertheless, it's a good question.

So, flipped class community, what's in a name?

For me, this is what's in a name:

• a method by which I started to listen more to my students, and work to meet their individual needs.  I learned most of those things from my community on Twitter and Edmodo.
• a move to a more reflective practice - one I never imagined.  I didn't know that to be reflective, you need someone who will help you process.  That is what happens in the flipclass community on a daily basis.
• a return to my writing - something I had always thought of, but never had inspiration to sustain.  This blog is the most meaningful writing I've done since I graduated from college.  And I am now writing more than just blog entries, which has helped me work through a lot, personally and professionally.
• a transformational experience - one that not only changed me, but changed how my students experience me as their teacher.  That was only possible by moving over the bridge that flipclass built.
• a group of people - my Cheesebuckets - who listen to me, protect me, question me, challenge me, and keep insisting that I should not stay where I am, but keep moving forward, getting better.  These people would not be in my life without flipclass.  And my life would be far less rich without them.
• and most importantly: a collaborative partner, a new BFF, someone to listen to me, help me channel my crazy ideas (and sometimes, add more craziness until they actually start to make sense), doesn't let me stay frustrated or resentful, but insists that we work things out, and most importantly, someone I can trust and who I know cares about me, both as a teacher and as a person, and about my work in the classroom.

So what's in a name?  A change that has given my students a better teacher and a better education.  A community where I am inspired, engaged in conversation, and often, challenged so that I don't grow stagnant.  

And most importantly, I now have friends.  Friends who share the family name - flipped class - and unites us around a common goal: making our classroom the best possible place for our individual and corporate student body, and for us as teachers.  

And even though some of us may start to grow into more distant cousins, if we give up the family name, it would mean denying where we came from.  This is the kind of family that doesn't disown a brother who shies away from family gatherings; it's the kind of family that expands, becomes more inclusive as more and more distant relations show up on our doorstep, needing our help, our acceptance, our love.  It's also the kind of family that still welcomes you, even when you don't need it anymore.

This family name is where our roots are.  

This family name is who our people are.  

This family name - flipped class - is who WE are.  Together.

That is what's in THIS name.  

And I'm proud to be in this family.  No Matter What.

I've written about my 6th period class a bit in previous posts.  They've been doing projects on an area of humour that we have not studied together.  

Today, we had a study in contrasts.

The first group started presenting on Friday, but because of some administrative tasks, they weren't able to finish.  Their presentation was about stand-up comedy.  More on them in a minute.

The second presentation group covered ten types of humour, with some examples.  Here is what they did (see if you recognise it):

1. Gave a handout with ten definitions of types of humour (slapstick, parody, satire, etc.).
  
2. Read the definitions off the PowerPoint (exact replica of the handouts).  Around the third slide, they lost the audience.  When the audience started to recognise that the presenters did not fully understand everything they were teaching, the audience responded by asking questions.  It started with factual questions - does that include x? What does y mean? - and progressed to more chatter than actual questions.  The audience actually seemed frustrated to not be learning and resentful of the waste of their class time.

3. At this point, the group rushed through the last few slides so they could get to the videos.  They hadn't made them hyperlinks, so they had to manually copy/paste them into another browser window.  Several members of the audience shouted at them to do control-click.  They either didn't hear or chose not to listen.

4. When they finally had the video ready, they didn't give context.  Just pressed play.

5. Less than half of the audience was paying attention.  They continued regardless.

6. After the first clip, they asked students to write their answer to the comprehension question on the back of the handout.  They had only made enough for each group to have one.  So they told the students to do it as a group.

7. Then they showed a second clip and gave them a second comprehension question.  

8. As class was about to end, they just went back to their seats and told students to "turn in the papers or something."

Is it their fault that their presentation wasn't effective in teaching the students, or engaging their attention?  Not necessarily.  They haven't been trained in how to present information, and have been less than attentive for much of the semester.  

Their presentation was the first one from that class that was anything less than mind-blowing (like producing a comedy video, leading an improv workshop, analysing memes about Marin...all fantastic and very funny).  For a student presentation, it certainly wasn't bad.  Yes, they committed some presentation sins (technical problems, reading off the PowerPoint, not being fully prepared, not keeping the audience engaged, etc.) but they met the requirements set out in the assignment.  They are decent students who are just not terribly engaged in school, and despite having the freedom to choose an elective, ended up in one they enjoyed but didn't really connect to.

**

It had been so different with the first group.  When they finished, I was astonished to realise that they hadn't just learned the tools of humour analysis.

They had learned effective lesson structure.

They had unknowingly used Explore Flip Apply - the same structure I have used to teach them all semester.

I didn't tell them my structure, and so certainly never encouraged them to follow it.

But here's the lesson they presented:

Explore:
Students were directed to a bitly address that took them to a collaborative google doc.  The presentation group asked them to write a joke - any joke.  It didn't even have to be funny.  They watched and laughed as their classmates entered jokes anonymously (since it was a public link, they didn't need to sign in....an intentional move by the group to let people have the freedom to be experimental).

Flip:
The group then presented a few techniques used by stand-up comedians, such as timing, exaggeration, and exploration of the unexpected.  They solicited feedback from the audience to clarify their misconceptions, and posed a few questions to check their understanding.  They showed several clips (since they ran out of time, they assigned one as homework - the "Hot Pockets" Jim Gaffigan routine - best. homework. ever.) and asked the students to identify some of the elements used, as well as analyse their effectiveness as humour tools.

Apply:
Finally, they had students go back to the google doc and look at their own joke again.  They asked them to revise their joke to add some of the elements.  Then they asked students to come up to the front and tell their joke as a stand-up routine, and then asked the audience to analyse the techniques used.  Four students volunteered and shared, and several more would have shared had there been time.

Finally, we did our Seminar Assessment reflection questions (which they had helpfully included in their presentation, even without it being required), where the group listened to the feedback respectfully.  They even offered some additional materials to let advanced learners find out more.

**

They Explore-Flip-Applied a presentation, on their own.  And it was as (if not more) effective than what I've taught them.

So how is it that one group was so successful, and the other group wasn't?  

Was it because of the strength of the relationship built with their classmates through discussions, seminars, and collaborative group work?  Sure.  The second group spent more time checking Facebook on their phone than participating in class.

Was it having clear passion for the subject and an intense desire to communicate that to their peers?  Absolutely.  The second group were far less attached to their topic than the first.

Was it having the necessary toolkit of skills?  Yes.  The second group struggles to think critically and write effectively.

Or was it because the first group took responsibility for their learning, and had ownership, and the second group didn't?

I think that's the key point.  All of the other things were essential to getting them there - relationships, passion, skills - but when they took ownership and had pride in their work, they naturally gravitated to the instructional technique they had learned first-hand from me.  And while the second group learned something, it was the first group that had really been transformed.

This presentation wasn't just something they did.  It became who they are.

And they don't need a grade to prove they learned something.

Nor do I need a test to prove that I taught something.

And now that I have a fresh start coming in a few weeks, I'm afraid that I won't be able to repeat this kind of awesomeness.  It's daunting to see the final product and think about starting over.

But maybe next semester, there won't be a second group.

There is a sense of individualism that has always been a part of the teaching profession.  In the United States, the first public schools were one-room schoolhouses where one teacher taught everything, and had to know everything.  There was an unshakable authority - they maintained strict discipline, and learning looked like periods of quiet study followed by recitation from memory.  Students were expected to work individually, learn individually, perform individually

Fast forward a few hundred years.  How different is our system now?  Teacher at the front.  Discipline for any student not exhibiting perfect behaviour.  Performance measured individually, from memory, in silence.

We are also raised to value this kind of individualism: the American Dream is the pinnacle of individualism.  We want to succeed, make ourselves look good, and show that we did it All On Our Own.

And so, as teachers, we continue in that model.  We build a classroom where we treat our students as individuals.  We focus on doing our personal best, and helping our students do their personal best.

We are doing it wrong.  

In the flipped learning world, many teachers focus on the idea of students having individualised plans.  We encourage them to learn via video in isolation, then return to class to display that knowledge individually.  We have group tasks, like discussions and laboratory assignments, but students are still expected to display mastery individually.  We want every student to be reached at his or her own level, and then get the resources to move up to the next level.  We even move our classes to be self-paced, so there is even more opportunity for them to be individuals.

When Andrew and I started the year, that was our goal: a classroom of self-paced students, working at their level to meet their individual needs.

A few weeks into it, we realised that it wasn't working.  We didn't know our students, and they didn't know each other.  They were working, but without passion or urgency or a sense of community.  They didn't understand WHY we wanted them to do what they were doing.

And we were pretty unhappy too.  Collaboration had changed our practice, yet we were not giving our students the same opportunity.  The best teachers we had in high school, and the best professors in college, were the ones who engaged us in discussion, encouraged us to collaborate on projects, and shared themselves with us.  But we had stripped all of that out of our classroom.

So we backed away from self-pacing and started intentionally building community and creating opportunities for collaboration.  Because it was all-new curriculum to us, we didn't have it planned far enough in advance to pull off any form of self-pacing, so we made sure there were opportunities for differentiation within our lessons.  

So we transitioned to a far more collaborative environment, but one that allowed for individualised instruction when and where needed.  An environment that allowed for students to talk, interact, build trust, and work together.  Just as Andrew and I had done all summer.

There are days where I question if what I'm doing deserves to be called "flipped."  We don't use video regularly.  We don't assign homework.  We don't even have lecture really.  So if you define "flipped learning" as "Students watch videos of lectures at home as homework, then do what would have been homework in class" we aren't flipped.  However, that's not how most of us in the flipped learning community define flipped learning.  It's not the core of what the flip is all about.

And maybe that's because it looks different for all of us.  You can't define something for which the primary goal is to tailor our curriculum to individual student needs.

But we have to be really careful.  Teaching a class that veers towards independent study (as ours did) robs students of one of the real gems of having them together - the collaboration that is possible.  We need to redefine learning as something that happens in community, not in isolation.

We need teachers who will lead the way in that - not just in running a classroom built on community, but modelling that kind of collaboration in their own lives.  Instead of having our own individual kingdoms, and shutting our doors to protect ourselves from invaders, we need to embrace the vulnerability, lower the cannons, and let people - the right people - in.

We have to redefine what it means to be a teacher, what it means to be a student, and what it means to be a community.  Learning is not an individual act.  It's a community process.  We learn by talking, we learn by doing, and we learn by creating.  And all of those things work better when we aren't doing them alone.

When we stop acting as individuals, and act in the interest of our community.

The future of flipped learning is not about individualising education, although that will happen.  The future of flipped learning is not about creating excellent videos with instruction to replace whole-class lecture, although that is a positive step for most teachers who once relied on class time being mostly direct instruction.  

No - the future of flipped learning is about collaboration.  The sooner we open our doors to other teachers (even ones not at our school, as Andrew and I have done) and we open the metaphorical doors to collaborative learning opportunities, the sooner our classrooms will be the ideal place for our students to get both individualised instruction, AND communal practice.

Teaching is exhausting, isolating, and difficult.  Teaching a flipped class is even more exhausting, isolating, and difficult.  

Unless we find collaborators, there is no way to survive the challenge we face: students who struggle with learning a different way, colleagues who question if what we're doing is the right thing, and anonymous attackers on the internet who refuse to understand us, or what we stand for.  Unless we find people who will support us, encourage us, plan with us, challenge us, and help us be better than we are, we will burn out.  We will fail.

We need each other.  We need community.  And we need to stand together.

Or we will all die alone.  And if we die, the transformative power of flipped learning dies with us.

"But, I just don't understand how you're grading them."

My mentor teacher (all employees new to the district gets one, regardless of experience) had just visited my class unannounced to watch my Language of Humour students present their final projects.  They had selected a text (this group chose a Brian Regan standup clip over which someone had done stick-figure animations), developed a discussion around audience and purpose, and created a writing assignment.  The group that presented engaged the audience and had well-developed activities.

They had some flaws - a few times, the presenters got into a conversation about what they liked about the video instead of paying attention to what the rest of the students in the room were doing.  I LOVED that they were so passionate about it, although I would have loved for them to channel that more into the discussion.  But what came shining through is their passion, their analytical ability, and their willingness to bring their classmates into discussion.  It was pretty cool to watch.

Before their presentation started, one group had a question about the writing activity - I asked each group to collect and grade the work completed during their presentation.  That's all the guidelines I gave them.  Most groups did full credit or no credit (a reflection of how most things are graded when I am doing the grading) without asking what/how they were supposed to do.  But a student in the group who had presented the previous class period wanted to know HOW he was to grade the work.  I told him to grade it however he liked - five points, a million points, whatever.  I trusted him and his group to be fair.

And as I was talking to my mentor teacher, he just couldn't understand two things:

1. How they were grading each other
2. How I was grading them

As I listened to his questions, I realised something:

My students never asked how (or even if) this would be graded.  In the two weeks they had been working on it, grades had never come up once.


My mentor just couldn't comprehend how that was possible.  How students could be motivated to do their work without some kind of accountability grade-wise.  How I didn't have a plan for how I would translate their performance into grades.

So I thought quickly: what would I want if I were a student presenting this information?

I would want to know my successes and failures.  I would want to know how effective the teacher believed my presentation to be at delivering the learning objectives.  

I would want a narrative.  Not a letter grade.  Not a rubric.

So I decided I would give them a narrative.  I'm a little obsessed with this right now, and I'm going to write some narratives in that style for my students.  Depending on how it goes, I may post a few of them here.  

I know some people will question what I'll actually put in the gradebook, as we still live in a point-based, letter grade world.  To be perfectly honest, most of them will probably get full credit.  The only ones who will receive less than full credit and the presentations that didn't include all required elements.  So far, every presentation has met all the requirements.  I don't feel like playing a game of "well, you lost two points for not looking up when you spoke" or "I know you chose a writing topic, but it could have been better so I'm taking off five points."  

They will still get feedback on their areas of strengths and weaknesses.  But their grade will reflect that they learned a lot, and helped their classmates learn something new. 

This is as close to a letter-grade-free world as I can get.

**

My mentor teacher didn't like my answer.  He wanted me to have a rubric.  Assign points.  Do something that was quantifiable.  

But what is going to make my students grow more?  What is going to develop their ability to own their learning?  

What will they remember more: a letter grade or a personal letter?

I know what I would want.

And what I am MOST proud of: the fact that the grade doesn't matter.  It doesn't matter to them, it doesn't matter to me.

So why should it matter to anyone else?