Over twitter the past few days, a lot of us have bemoaned the fact that our students 
Just. 
Aren't. 
Getting. 
It.

They fight back against the newness of flipclass, they fight back against the demand that they take responsibility, they fight back against the level of thinking we ask them to do, or they just fight because they don't know what we want of them.

And as frustrating as all of that is, they are not the problem.

We are.

I can't tell you about your classroom, but I can tell you about mine, and a little bit about Andrew's, because those are the only two I've seen from experience.  The "we" and "our" from this point on refers to both Andrew and I.

The problems:

1. We jumped in full force.  Our students went from knowing nothing about us or our class to being full flipped mastery, Explore-Flip-Apply, student-centred, higher order thinking, asynchronous, etc.  Since we were both new to the school, we couldn't even pull on our former students and our ethos to protect us from the backlash against everything we were doing.  So we just assumed they would trust us.  And many did, but some didn't.

2. Lots has changed from the first day.  We didn't have enough organisation, especially around how we managed/used technology.  They were confused and frustrated, and arguably still are.

3. We had curriculum, but it was in progress and brand new to both of us.  We didn't know what to expect when we were planning over the summer, so we did our best.  But there were SO many things we couldn't have expected or planned for.  So we were/are unprepared.

4. We forgot just how much we know and have gotten used to.  Our kids had never blogged, used Twitter, had two teachers, watched videos for instruction, used backchannels, used Edmodo, etc.  Every time we talk about our flipped class with newbies, it reminds us of how much we take for granted, and how unique our class really is.  But we didn't give our students the same schema so they feel lost, confused, and frustrated.

5. We want them to love our class and how we teach it.  And when they don't, it makes us question if we're doing the right thing.  Which makes it worse.

6. We didn't scaffold them up to the release of responsibility - we just believed that they would "get it" along the way.  Even though we were teaching skills slowly, and building their technology skills slowly, we still expected them to be able to keep track of their work and progress.

***

Yes, our students bear some fault.  But it's still our responsibility.

I don't know what the answer is, except that we are the problem.

The honest truth is that there are some things that are more important than what happens in our classrooms.  And without going into too much detail, we have had a lot on our plates outside of our teaching.

But This is the Truth:

• Our students need help to see the roadmap we've written.  They can't see the connections, and they can't understand why things have to change.  But they trust us to teach them what they need to know.  And they keep turning up.  So we need to do better.  We need to be better.
  
• There is no situation beyond redemption.  We always have another chance.  If we have a bad day, our kids will give us another chance, so long as we are honest and transparent with them.  It's never as bad as we think it is, and never as good as we think it is.  And each day starts new.

• Teaching, just like friendship, is a commitment.  We can't just give up because we don't feel like it. When it gets difficult, we have to press in to our community.  And we have to trust that our community will help us, even when we don't know what we need.

And so the only way we can find our way out of this mess is by working together.  We need to find ways to introduce our students to the radical shift in educational models.  We need to find a bridge from the factory model to the student-centred, higher level thinking flipped mastery asynchronous whatever that we're heading towards.

So if it's a mess in your room, and your students aren't able to take the responsibility required to function in a flipped class, let's start a conversation.  We don't have any answers.  

But we believe that together, we can make it work.

Andrew and I have worked incredibly hard this year to make our team-teaching a success.  We spend hours planning over G+ Hangout, or in Google Drive documents, and we are pretty proud of what we've accomplished.  None of the material in our first unit was anything we had ever taught (with the exception of one of the short texts each).

We also believe in open source, free materials for teachers.  We do not intend to ever sell our materials.  We want to give them away for free with the caveat that you give us credit for the work.  We, by no means, want to present the material as if we think it's perfect - it's not.  There are lots of changes we will make when we teach it next (since we both have new students at the semester, it will be January-February when we teach it again).

But for now, here is the unit - complete with planning documents and links to every assignment, text, grading rubric, and warm-up.  If something is listed but doesn't appear, let us know and we'll fix it right away!  Almost all of the links are through Mentor Mob, since that's where we store our student playlists.

I hope you find it useful.  It's been amazing to plan and teach, and we hope that others can use some of the ideas we have developed here.

Here is the information from the document linked above:


The Master List of Unit 1 Resources
Andrew Thomasson and Cheryl Morris

Planning Documents:
Original Unit Plan (with full assignment descriptions, although a bit different from what we ended up teaching)
Skills Map (Thomasson’s iteration)  
Morris’ iterations: 1 2 (Morris modified her maps from the main document)

Playlists:
Weeks 1-3 (Morris)   
Weeks 1-2 (Thomasson)    
Smoke in Our Lights (both)    
Weeks 3-6 (both)

Unit Goals:

1. Introducing students to the technical processes they need for the class
2. Easing them into the flipped class part - how to watch video, how asynchronous instruction works, how mastery grading works, etc.
3. Familiarise them with the patterning strategy and why we use it
4. Making inferences based on evidence
5. Constructing a definition, both in narrative and informational writing
6. Collaborate with peers on a variety of tasks, and differentiate that from doing Group Work.

Essential questions:

• What is a flipped class, and how does OUR flipped class work?
• What goes into a good definition, and how does that differ based on genre and purpose?
• What is the best way to collaborate, and how is that different from cooperative learning/group work?
• What is a pattern and how do those patterns build meaning in a text?
• How do you access meaning beyond the literal/surface level?

Since our classes are asynchronous much of the time, this is mostly a suggested pacing, and is close to our actual pacing.  It took Morris six weeks, with about 240 minutes per week (11th-12th graders), and it took Thomasson four and a half weeks, with about 450 minutes per week (10th graders).  Please use any resources freely, so long as you give us credit for our work.

How do we get students to take responsibility for what they are learning, rather than expecting us to help them every step along the way?

It's a hard question to answer because I believed that I never had to have anyone motivating me to do my schoolwork.  

But that's not entirely true.  There are many times (even now as an adult) that I act much like my students who would be on the "not taking responsibility for learning" list.  So I tried to find patterns.  Here's what I came up with:

1. When I feel as if my time is being wasted, I stop caring.
2. When the instructor proves to be incompetent, either in content knowledge or in adequate preparation, I stop wanting to listen.
3. When there is open disdain or resentment towards me/the class/the audience/the subject/the organisation, it shuts me down.
4. When I don't get enough time to process, I stop "playing school."
5. When I don't see the relevance to my life or practice, I tune out.
6. When I am personally overwhelmed by something wholly unrelated to school, I disengage. 
7. When I am not treated like a respected colleague and peer, I fight back or I give up.

Are those the reasons my students don't take responsibility for their learning?

I had to honestly ask myself these dangerous questions (and I encourage you to as well):

• Do I prepare enough to make it feel like class time is productive, rather than wasted?
• Do I present myself in such a way at to make students think I believe I know everything and am the sole/main source of learning in the classroom?
• Do I treat my students as peers in learning, rather than as passive recipients of knowledge?
• Do I give them enough time to process and reflect, and help them understand how what they're doing is relevant to their lives?
• Do I take good enough care of myself that I'm healthy and able to do my job effectively as much as humanly possible?
• Do I use my authority to shut them down?  Do I make them feel like they aren't as good as me because I am the one with her name on the door?

Sometimes, I do a good job.  Sometimes, I don't.

***

The thing I think Andrew and I haven't done well enough this year is helping students see the relevance of what we're doing, and how it is helping them learn important skills.  

We started this unit with these goals:

1. Introducing students to the technical processes they need for the class
2. Easing them into the flipped class part - how to watch video, how asynchronous instruction works, how mastery grading works, etc.
3. Familiarise them with the patterning strategy and why we use it
4. Making inferences based on evidence
5. Constructing a definition, both in narrative and informational writing
6. Collaborate with peers on a variety of tasks, and differentiate that from doing Group Work.

And these were our essential questions:

• What is a flipped class, and how does OUR flipped class work?
• What goes into a good definition, and how does that differ based on genre and purpose?
• What is the best way to collaborate, and how is that different from cooperative learning/group work?
• What is a pattern and how do those patterns build meaning in a text?
• How do you access meaning beyond the literal/surface level?

So those were great goals and essential questions, but none of the instructional design matters if I'm not creating a classroom where students are responsible for their own learning.

***

So I need to change.  These are my answers to my own questions:

• Do I prepare enough to make it feel like class time is productive, rather than wasted?

Most days, I am prepared enough to make it through that day.  But the last few weeks, we haven't been planned far enough ahead that I could LET students work ahead.  Which meant wasted class time.

• Do I present myself in such a way at to make students think I believe I know everything and am the sole/main source of learning in the classroom?

No.  I believe that I've presented myself as someone who is learning alongside them.

• Do I treat my students as peers in learning, rather than as passive recipients of knowledge?

Yes. I've even had days where students suggested doing something related, and we've changed the plan.  Some of those were the best days.  I believe that I have as much to learn from them as they from us.

• Do I give them enough time to process and reflect, and help them understand how what they're doing is relevant to their lives?

This is the one that hurts.  I think I give them time to process, but there have been times when I've cut off a discussion because we needed to move on.  I also haven't let them reflect enough to make meaning of everything we're doing.  I haven't convinced them that learning how to use a blog is useful.  I haven't convinced them that patterning is helpful.  This is the place I need to focus for the next unit.

• Do I take good enough care of myself that I'm healthy and able to do my job effectively as much as humanly possible?

I want to say yes to this.  I'm pretty sure Andrew would say no, that I'm not.  Working on it.

• Do I use my authority to shut them down?  Do I make them feel like they aren't as good as me because I am the one with her name on the door?  Do they feel safe, emotionally and academically in my class?

I think I'm doing okay on this one.  There is always room for improvement.


***

So here's what I've decided on why students not fully taking responsibility:

1. We are not always planned enough to let them work at their own speed.  We need to plan more so students can work ahead.
2. They don't understand why they are learning what they're learning.  We need to show them exactly what they're learning, because they are actually learning a lot.
3. They need more time to process, which means less synchronous work.  The end of this unit has been on collaboration, so a lot of it has been at the same pace.  But not all partners work at the same pace, so one group inevitably finishes early and another is still working after the bell.  This will change in the next unit.
4. They don't see how everything connects, or where it's going.  That was intentional, but I think it was the wrong decision.
5. They aren't reflecting enough on their own learning process and progress.  In the final assessment, there will be a reflection to help address this.

So in the next unit, those are our key focus areas.  If you have ideas that can help, please let us know!

Coming soon: our entire first unit with all the resources we used for six weeks of a high school English flipped class.  We will publish EVERYTHING.  For free.  We're really excited to share it - we're proud of what we've accomplished together in this unit.

Today, we tried something new.  

Last week, students wrote a first draft of their definition essays and posted it to their blog.  

Today, they answered the following questions:
1. What are you trying to say about yourself in this essay?
2. What would you like to improve in your essay? (not spelling/grammar)
3. What questions do you have about the essay?
4. How emotionally connected are you to your topic?  Will it bother you if someone is critical?  What advice do you have for your partner when they read their essay in order to help you most?

Then they got into the computer lab and made a google doc to which both partners had access.  They chose one essay to start revising, and I showed them how to make comments and gave them some guidelines on working together.

What I saw happen:
--students were talking about the structure of the essay and how successful it was
--students giving each other advice and taking it all constructively, not as personal attack
--students enjoying the process of writing together in real time, and couldn't get over how easy it was to save and access work in google drive
--real feedback meant that students were engaging with their own work at a deeper level
--arguments happened, but they were all friendly ("You have to choose: past or present!  Which one?" "I can have both!" etc.) and all were productive
--some students had very little written, and many of those students benefitted most from this because they got to explain their idea and have a partner help them put words to it


I'll write about the collaborative humour writing my students did later.  But this was pretty revolutionary for us.  It's changed the way Andrew and I write professionally, and I can't wait to see the improvement that our students see in their writing as a result of collaborative writing.

There are a lot of people who will tell you that mastery grading won't work with English.

Andrew Thomasson and I disagree.  We're doing it, actually, and it's working pretty well so far.

Here's our video explaining the philosophy and basic principles of Mastery:

Our Mastery system is based in large part on an idea stolen from Jon and Aaron.  Here's our latest grade table:

In this first unit, we are assessing the following things for mastery:
1. Process of posting to their blog, accessing and using all their Google accounts
2. Making an inference based on evidence
3. Writing an essay that defines who they are through a transformational experience
4. Developing a project that shows mastery of a concept
5. Having a conversation with a group that shows their ability to come to a collaborative definition
6. Reading a text and finding patterns
7. Making meaning of those patterns to determine author's intent

Some of those are processes, and some are about content.  This whole first unit is built on the idea of Explore Flip Apply, and all of those skills and processes were developed throughout the unit in that way.  As an example:

Patterning
Explore: Students read a text and find any repeated ideas or patterns.  Discuss with group to find commonalities.

Flip: Students watched this video:

Apply: Students went back through the text and made meaning from the pattern we found but didn't explicitly trace in the video.  They had to have a group discussion with us to demonstrate that they understood the pattern and how it affected the meaning in the text.

We patterned several other texts in that way (some with a video, some with live in-class modelling of the patterns we found), and the final assessment will ask students to pattern a new text and make meaning of it on their own.

***

Now, we still live in a point-based reality.  So somehow, we need to give students points for getting to mastery.  The way we decided to make it work is to give students all the points for showing mastery, and none if they didn't.  At the end of the unit, the assessment is graded on a rubric, but all other strands are all/nothing.  So 20 out of the 55 unit points are graded on a rubric.  That means that about 1/3 of the unit points are in the assessment and NOT all/nothing.

If students get all the points for the classwork, the most they can get is an 85% - to get the other 15%, they need to complete the Blank White Page project work for the unit.  This is straight-up stolen from Karl Lindgren-Streicher.  Thanks, buddy.

The last thing to mention is the Behind Line.  That's the date on which work should be completed, but students are not "late" until the unit is over.  I don't think we'll take work after the unit is over, but we need to see how it shakes out before deciding for sure.  It's all based on the idea that students can work ahead, but not fall behind.  Often, we will still do synchronous work in class, so we want students to stay near the same point through this unit.  Again, we'll reassess later.

The students are responding positively to this - in fact, they've stopped asking about their grades now, and seem to trust that this is as straight-forward as we keep promising. The true test will come at the end of the unit.

Every year, I have the same anticipation leading up to the school year.  There are unlimited ideas and possibilities.

And then we hit week 4.

And I'm suddenly aware of how much less I can actually do than I wanted and planned to do.  And that silences me. 

So I stop blogging, just in case someone can read in between the lines at how much I'm failing.  

I stop going on Twitter, just in case someone asks me how things are going and I have to tell the truth.

Colleagues stop me in the hallway, and I tell them that "I'm fine" - which is a total lie.  Because I can't tell them the truth:  I'm afraid that what I'm doing isn't good enough.

I start hiding.

I ignore the evidence that learning is happening and that students are making connections between what we're doing and what I want them to learn.  I ignore the opinion of the person who knows my classroom and curriculum better than I do and believes in me far more than I believe in me.  I ignore the parents who left my room on Back to School Night telling me how "inspired" they felt and how "exciting" it was to hear about flipped class and blank white page and all the other amazing things we're doing.

I ignore all of that.  Because the voice in my head keeps telling me it's Not. Good. Enough.  And that voice turns into a chorus of every bad experience from my eight previous years in the classroom - from overbearing principals, to judgemental colleagues, to critical students.

That's The Narrative.  The voice in my head that repeats every negative thing anyone has said about me, my classroom, and my educational beliefs.  The voice of colleagues who never ran out of things to complain about.  The voice of administrators who just didn't get what I was doing.

The Narrative says that I'm failing.  And for eight years, I had no idea how to stop it.

But now I do.

****

Now, I don't think a reflective teacher can ever stop believing The Narrative entirely, because it comes with wanting to do a great job and knowing that it is impossible.  The classroom has too many variables, there is too little time, and there is always too much we want to do.  We want to change the lives of our students.  We want to make a difference.

And we do.

But life change doesn't happen overnight.  It's a series of small decisions, small actions, small words.  And when we show up every day and put our heart and effort and time into teaching our students everything we can, we change their lives...in small increments.  Trust and community are not built overnight, and no amount of wishing or planning can make them appear.  

The only thing that can build trust and community is love.  Love for our students, love for our curriculum, and love for our profession.  It is the only thing that can change anything.

Love is the only thing that can stop The Narrative.  

I know that sounds a little like I'm singing Kumbyah while holding hands with fairies and dancing around Stonehenge.  

And frankly, I don't care.  

Love is wanting your friends and colleagues to succeed so much that it's more important than your own success.  And paradoxically, having so many people to root for has made me more successful as a teacher than ever before.  And with that many people cheering for me, I can't hide.  

Having so many people on my team means that it's impossible to let The Narrative win.

I have colleagues at Redwood who check in on me to make sure I'm okay.  Before Back to School Night, I had over half the department come to see me to give me advice and see if I needed any help.

I have students who work hard and make me want to work even harder.  Who write about the tragedies that shaped them in a completely open and honest way.  Who can't quite believe that I really mean what I say about there being "no anxiety" in my classroom.

I have administrators who go out of their way to understand what I'm doing and support me so I can continue to do my job.

I have friends in the #flipclass community who give me advice, send me resources, and offer support when I need it.

And best of all, I'm team-teaching with Andrew Thomasson, and he won't let me fail.  He also knows me well enough to see when I'm letting The Narrative take over a little too much and he Won't Let The Narrative Win.  The impact Andrew has had on my classroom and my life is a little ridiculous.  It's been postulated in the #flipclass community that we may even be the same person.  

I can't help but be overwhelmed to have so much support, especially in a profession where isolation is just the accepted reality.  I have never had so many people cheering for me.  All of those things are small decisions that people make, and that adds up to a transformation in who I am as a teacher, as well as how much power The Narrative has over me.

When you have that many people who care about you, it's impossible to close your door and pray that no one notices how much you're failing.  

So it's time to Flip The Narrative:

You can't do this alone.  And when you're not alone, and you have people who love you and root for you, you can't fail.  And when it feels like you are ready to give up and shut up and admit defeat, you look at all the small decisions people have made to show how much they care.  And that's enough to keep going.

In the Flipped Narrative, we all win:
Our students get the best version of us we have.
Our colleagues get the passion and excitement we have for our classroom.
Our PLN gets more resources, more support, and more of us.
And we get people to help us recognise all the small decisions we make every day, and how those decisions are a far better measure of our success than The Narrative would like us to believe.

So flipping my classroom really has changed my life...in small increments.  

And it's Not Over Yet.

The way Andrew and I have been teaching is new for our students.

It's new for us, for that matter.

It's not the Teacher Lectures and Student Studies the Textbook paradigm.  And our students really struggled with the transition.

So I decided to ask them what they were learning in my class.  We've been working on these three playlists.

I wasn't expecting much because it really seems like they weren't "getting it" and making the right connections.

Here were the results for the topic:

What are you learning in this class?  What do you think we want you to know/be able to do?


Wordle (all classes combined)

Original notes from the 1st period discussion:

Sorry it's not super legible.  The check marks indicate when another group said something that was already up there.

I'm really proud of them.  

They ARE learning! :-)