Flipping the Classroom!

I recently read two articles about what "Flipping a classroom" means. Why It's Time to Rethink (And Question) Homework and 7 Things You Should Know About Flipped Classrooms shed light on one of the more recent methodologies of teaching. Flipping a classroom, according to these articles, describes a scenario in which a student watches videos before class (comparable to a lecture of a professor) and then when he or she comes to class, the time is spent there with activities that reinforce the lectures. While I find this to be a brave attempt at creating a new methodology of the classroom, I don't necessarily agree with it. I haven't seen the quantitative facts, nor have I researched how the students feel and get along with this program, but I don't think this is a one-size-fits-all program. I say this because many students don't feel motivated to do the homework they are assigned already, but to add more on top of it? Students must learn the material themselves and then do more homework and spend class time with hands-on activities? I think this type of classroom would fit motivated and gifted learners, but what about our special learners? Or the the students that aren't yet so self-motivated? Also, I would ask the question, How do students now feel about the roles of their teachers now that they aren't teaching material? Again, I think this is a brave attempt to create a new classroom system, but it would have to be way more geared towards specific learners. I hope to learn more about this system and see how they could manipulate it and regulate it, but until then.. I don't think I'm a believer.

Using TubeChop in the Classroom

For any teacher who struggles to find videos to meet the classroom time limitations, there is a solution! Recently, I explored the tool TubeChop which is an online tool that lets you single out important parts in a YouTube video that you might like to show in class, without having to show the whole video! What a miracle! You can shorten hour long videos and make them thirty seconds if you want to! This is an important tool for teachers because as we all know the one thing we're missing in the day is time. So yes, now you can show as many videos as you want to without having to worry about wasting too much class time. In my classroom activity, I didn't utilize TubeChop to the max as my video correlates to a complete story but TubeChop cut out almost 10% of the video that was unnecessary to listen to before and after the material that I wanted to focus on. Now, with a three minute video, this doesn't sound like much, but with an hour long video, it saves a huge amount of time, time that we as teachers don't have. So for this assignment, I didn't cut a huge amount of time off of my video but I practiced using TubeChop successfully and found it to be an extremely useful tool for the future. For an activity in class for my ESOL students I chose to focus on a cultural topic as it is the holiday season and well as follow up with this cultural lesson with some oral feedback as well as writing reflections. Showing this video as an activity would hit a total of three standards: Standard 5 Language for Cross-Cultural Knowledge and Understanding, Standard 4 Language for Social Interaction, and Standard 2 Language for Literary Response and Enjoyment. My TubeChop Video is the Story of Thanksgiving. I would show this video in class to my ESOL students to demonstrate a holiday that we celebrate here in the United States. I think the language in the video is language appropriate as well as culturally appropriate for my learners. I would show the video in class and have my students then orally discuss what they had seen in the video, checking for comprehension as well as looking for reflection of this holiday and how they perceive it. I would also have the students for homework write a paragraph discussing the video that we watched and have them reflect on this U.S. holiday and then discuss a holiday that they celebrate in their home country. I would check their homework the next day and allow students to share their feelings and paragraphs. This would not only be a fun activity to display to students, but it would also hit almost all, but specifically 3, of the standards. Thanks for taking the time to read!

Using the Game Escape the Room in a Classroom Setting

In this phase in my online class, we are learning about gamification. My previous post expanded on the notion of what gamification is and how it can be used in the class. I came across an article in our syllabus that talked about the nature of Escape the Room games and how they can be beneficial for ESOL students. If you aren't sure what Escape the Room games are, here's a basic description according to the article Focus on Genre: Escape the Room Games, "A point-and-click adventure game where players have to escape from imprisonment by exploiting their surroundings..." Players are asked to click on anything in their surroundings and gradually piece things together to be able to escape the situation in which they have been places. One particular escape game I found to be thrilling is the Phantasy Quest game. This is an escape game that depicts you being stuck on an island and having to use the tools and objects around you to be able to make it through safely. Although I've played many Escape the Room games before, I've only played this particular one 3 times. The first time, I tried to see as far as I could get without a walkthrough. The next two times I completed it with a walkthrough to make sure that the directions that they gave me allowed me to win the game. The first time took quite some time and required a lot of repetition and trying new things. I really liked this game. It has you hooked from the moment you start playing. This creates great possibilities for using this with students. The last couple times I played was using the Phantasy Quest Walkthrough. I did this to be able to create a working game for a potential future classroom. I never realized the potential of using one of these games in my class until I pondered about the walkthrough. To understand a walkthrough, you need to know directions, verbs, and so much vocabulary. If provided computers in school, this would be a great activity to help students listen to explicit directions. According to the NYS ESOL Standards, Standard 1 can be directly focused on by using one of these games in class. Standard one says that students will use language for information and understanding. This game is PERFECT for working on that task. While playing this game in an ideal classroom, each student would have a computer. You may have to get creative if there isn't one available to each students but if so this is how I see this game being used for an activity. First I would explain to the students what the Escape the Room games are about and how to navigate through the pages. After gaining the general idea I would let them play around on the site to be able to practice picking things up and making sure that their technical use of the computers is going okay. I would then have them restart the game to start at the beginning. My role as the teacher would be to be the reader of the walkthrough. I would hold the walkthrough and read the steps out loud to the students. From hearing my specific instructions, the students should be able to navigate through the specific task that I am asking for instance, turn left and pick up the bottle. After I've given students time to complete the task, I would walk through and make sure that the task is complete, checking for comprehension. If I see that a student needs help or hasn't completed the task I might repeat the directions again. If they still aren't understanding I would have brought in picture references so that I could show them what to do. Some of the vocabulary might be a little tricky. Some might struggle through one step while others breeze through it and vice versa. I don't expect every student to get every step right but as long as the majority they do I'll be happy. This is a great listening task and checks for understanding and comprehension. Students would be engaged playing a game but as the same time learning new vocabulary and learning how to follow directions. By checking the students after each step, I would be making sure that they are active in the learning process and making sure they are on task and understanding. From this, I could figure out which students are struggling from what and pinpoint helping points for future lessons. I would encourage all teachers to try out this activity in the class, students would love it, I know I did!

Twitter in Education

Twitter, as per any blogging site, is a way to share information. As learners, we can't know everything. It's a great resource to have other people to seek information from. Twitter does exactly this. It's a pool of knowledge from people from your field with experience and years ahead of you!

A couple pieces of information on how to get the most out of twitter for educational and professional purposes comes from the article The Teacher's Guide to Twitter. Within this article it lists four important ways to get the most out of twitter: Create, Don't just consume, Connect and Network, Keep at it, and Share your resources. Aren't these all ways to valuable learning and being a teacher without even knowing that twitter was involved? Aren't we as teachers creators, networkers, persistent, and fountains of information? Twitter brings these all together on one website. It keeps us up-to-date and constantly learning without having to research multiple sites. Like other blogging and social media sites, Twitter provides learners with news and new ideas. I could definitely see myself using this in my classroom. I don't think that I would require its use among my students but for my own professional development as a teacher, I can see myself using it. It''s never a bad thing to build up your fountains of information and resources. Another valuable piece of information about twitter and micro-blogging comes from the article Using Micro-Blogging Platforms for Educational Purposes. One quote that stands out to me in this article is "You’ll also find stuff you never knew existed. Use it how it works for you and just take it from there. Enjoy the adventure!" This article mostly explains the way to get the most out of twitter and tips for using it as an educational blogging site rather than person entertainment. Again, Twitter is just a way to find new fountains of information and learn about things you never knew existed, Enjoy the ride and the learning :)

A learner is like...

A learner is like a sponge, constantly soaking up and growing bigger by what is around them. Learners have the ability, in the right environment, to keep on growing and soaking up information. If however their environment lacks the right conditions, they can dry up once again and lose that information. Providing students with a nurturing environment can give unlimited potential to what a student can soak up. In an age where traditional learning is almost obsolete, we must invent new ways for students to learn. We must stimulate their minds so that when they leave the classroom, the knowledge that they have doesn't dry up.

In the article Connectivism: A Learning Theory for the Digital Age, George Siemens makes an especially good point when he says the following, "Learning needs and theories that describe learning principles and processes, should be reflective of underlying social environments." A social environment now a days involves technology which should be directly influencing what students learn in school. They shouldn't be learning a method or way to do something and never be able to use it again. We need to supply our learners with the equipment needed to be successful so they can continue to use these strengths and soak up the world. By equipping students to do this, we are ensuring that they are prepared for higher-level learning as well as being successful in the future. We need to ensure that they will not lose this information and that the half-life of their knowledge will be significantly decreased.

Another quote of George Siemens as stated in his YouTube video entitled The Changing Nature of Knowledge, speaks again to the relevance of technology in the classroom, "Knowledge is really about the distribution that occurs across an entire network." He relates to the fact that knowledge these days isn't just about what an individual learns in class and retains inside his or her own head. It's also about the collectivism and connectivism theory that allows people to join together as a collection of ideas and knowledge and pool what they know with each other. Technology has made this a possibility and a reality. We are able to form a community of learners and share what we know among others. We can retain that information as a sponge does and on top of that, rely on what the professionals or peers in our life know as well and together, we are a bigger sponge.

So you think you're JUST a teacher?

As a up-and-coming teacher, I've found that the word teacher doesn't quite cover exactly what we do. We are role-models, world-changers, and most importantly, innovators. On a daily basis we strive to give our students the best education that we can so that they can survive and thrive in the ever-growing world. Technology is becoming more intertwined into the education system. It helps students to become more modern but also more global. One way that we can be successful teachers is to introduce and give our students the opportunities to prepare themselves to be ready for the new age of technology and give them a whole new sense of learning in the classroom.


One video that I watched that really shows what teaching with technology can become is A Vision of 21st Century Teachers. Teachers of all ages participate in this video to show various ways in which they use technology in their classroom and empowering others to do the same. I particularly like this video because to be honest, at this point in my life I'm not so tech savvy! Through taking a technology course at my university as well as informing myself of the various technologies out there, I believe that I am assuring a better future for my students. This video gives various methods in which you can bring technology into the classroom on a simple level as well as more advanced methods. A few examples from the teachers in the video include: "My students use digital cameras to capture math in the real world," and "My students shoot videos to express themselves." These are simple yet innovative ways to bring technology into the classroom. I encourage all to watch this video.


Another video that I found appealing to reasons why the "traditional classroom" isn't quite working anymore is Educational Change Challenge. It refers to the traditional classroom as almost a jail cell. Why limit student's education to the four walls surrounding them? Should kids be defined to a setting where they are all supposed to learn only in the classroom and at the exact same pace? He refers to this system as almost industrial. We are pushing kids through the system on a conveyer belt. But not all students are alike, nor on the same level and we need change. He asks the simple question, "Am I creating life-long learners?" I like this video because it explains the relevance of students and teachers being on the same level of culture. Teachers need to be constantly teaching and learning for themselves how to help their students to be the most successful that they can be. Don't be afraid to experiment because in the end, you are only helping your students to grow and once again, becoming an innovator.


We are teachers, We can do it!