twitterflipping the classroom: social media for independent learning
TRANSCRIPT
TwitterFlipping the Classroom: Social Media for Independent Learning
Terese Bird and Alison Fox University of Leicester
ALT-C 2015 Manchester UK 8 September 2015
Wyggeston and Queen Elizabeth I College Lesson Study Project 2014
• “In a sixth-form college setting to what extent do teachers, working collaboratively, perceive that the use of Twitter as a pedagogical tool can support student learning?” (Fox, 2015)
• College teachers supporting each other to use Twitter to enhance teaching
Interesting intersections
Social Media in Learning
Flipped Learning
Independent Learning
AS & A Level students needed independent learning skills
• The school
• high-achieving
• mobile phone ban
• The teachers
• some never used social media
• some used only personally
• some firmly using social media in teaching
• The students
• some liked the idea of using social media for learning
• some did not
Independent Learning• “Independent study is a process, a
method and a philosophy of education: in which a student acquires knowledge by his or her own efforts and develops the ability for inquiry and critical evaluation.” (Candy, 1990)
• Higher Education Academy (2014) Independent learning, York.
• Meyer, B., Haywood, N., Sachdev, D. and Faraday, S. (2008) What is independent learning and what are the benefits for students?, London.
Supporting the interventionDr Fox and I explored with teachers the use of social media especially Twitter and notion of flipped classroom
The Flipped Classroom began in high schools
• “Instead of having the lecture in school and do homework at home, have the lecture at home, and do the homework in school”
• High school chemistry teachers Bergmann and Sams recorded their lectures 2007 (Bergmann & Sams, 2012)
• Clintondale High School (Rosenberg, 2013)
• Video is the preferred formathttp://www.flippedhighschool.com/
What is flipped learning and how can social media do it?
• “pedagogical approach in which direct instruction moves from the group learning space to the individual learning space, and the resulting group space is transformed into a dynamic, interactive learning environment where the educator guides students as they apply concepts and engage creatively in the subject matter.” (Flipped Learning Network, 2014)
(Flipped Learning Network, 2014)
TwitterFlipping with Mrs Caviness
(November & Mull, 2012)
How our teachers proceeded
English Gov’t & Politics Maths
• Set a task and chose supporting resources
• Tweeted resources • Supported students
with Twitter in class, to do the task
• Planned a day to debate
• Tweeted material pertaining to each side so Twitter helped prepare to do the debate
• Realised students needed to follow her first
• Set an open-ended task for students to find resources toward findings, using Twitter
• After this task, continued tweeting exam revision and other helps
How our teachers proceeded
Students’ use of teachers’ tweets -> independent learning
• Behavioural prompt: “If you see a teacher’s tweets then you get the incentive ‘Oh let me start doing some work’. It is good to warn you, to give more information and to help you research.”
• Push technology: “With emails you have to login to something, with Twitter it is just there as soon as you pick up your phone.”
• Springboard to research: Student liked the fact links a good starting point for research, a good springboard.
• Collaboration: Student commented it would be a good idea for them to find their own links and share them too.
• Lesson reinforcement: Wanted “further reading after lessons through a link to website or maybe a particular question or picture.. regularly to help you understand the lesson better”
• Exam prep: “When you are looking at past papers and need an explanation for particular questions you don’t really understand, the interaction between you and your teachers would make it quicker than having to come all the way here.”
• Caution: addictive: “I don’t want to [use it] because loads of people are addicted to it.. “
Teachers’ views of tweeting• Flipped learning: “We can get them in the habit of pre-learning because I think
the Twitter thing was partially why we’re interested in this, but the idea that they would do some of the basic leg work before we get to the lessons and then we can spend more time discussing ideas and putting theories to practice when we analyse texts in English language or, if it’s for literature, discussing how an argument is developed by a critique and then seeing whether it matches with our interpretation of text there. So getting them to work at a higher level and really preparatory for university…”
• Good use of social media: “I’ve had quite a few students who, they now use Twitter and they follow economists and that’s all.”
• Draw them to the VLE/other material:“It’s also good I think for getting them to look at our Moodle page. A couple of the links were on Moodle. So they opened up the Tweet and then it took them back to the Moodle page and some of them were actually quite surprised at what was on there.
• September Start:“From September with all your classes it’s, ‘Hey. First lesson. This is what we do. You need to be following or bookmark me by tomorrow morning’, sort of approach. That’s what I find works. It’s like the first piece of homework.”
• It’s for the A* students too: “Concerned that the more able students, not all on Twitter, are yet sure that it will benefit them.”
Independent learning• More able students:
• select information
• access content
• critically engage
• Lower attaining students:
• remind and support revision
• Multimedia resources attractive
• Demonstrate interest in subject beyond the syllabus —for personal statement
• “…encourages students to read more outside of lessons and can also be used to stretch the more able.”
ConclusionsTeacher-supported use of social media
by students is…
• Successful flipped learning
• Successful independent learning
• Still being used and developed
Digital Literacies
(Jisc, 2015)
A social media charter: SMILE
http://tinyurl.com/smile-2014-event
(Fox & Bird, 2015)
References• Bergmann, J. and Sams, A. (2012) Flip your classroom: reach every student in every class every day,
Washington, DC, International Society for Technology in Education.
• Candy, P. C. (1990) ‘Self-Direction for Lifelong Learning. A Comprehensive Guide to Theory and Practice.’, Jossey-Bass, 350 Sansome Street, San Francisco, CA 94104-1310., [online] Available from: http://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED353470 (Accessed 7 September 2015).
• Flipped Learning Network (2014) ‘Flipped Learning Definition’, Flipped Learning Network Website, [online] Available from: http://flippedlearning.org/domain/46 (Accessed 4 September 2015).
• Fox, A. (2015) Developing Twitter use for Teaching: Report of Wyggeston and Queen Elizabeth I College Lesson Study Project 2014, Leicester.
• Fox, A. and Bird, T. (2015) A social media charter, Leicester, UK, [online] Available from: http://www2.le.ac.uk/colleges/ssah/news/smile-2014-event/charter (Accessed 5 September 2015).
• Higher Education Academy (2014) Independent learning,York.
• Jisc (2015) Quick guide - Developing students’ digital literacy, [online] Available from: http://digitalcapability.jiscinvolve.org/wp/files/2014/09/JISC_REPORT_Digital_Literacies_280714_PRINT.pdf (Accessed 25 June 2015).
• Meyer, B., Haywood, N., Sachdev, D. and Faraday, S. (2008) What is independent learning and what are the benefits for students?, London.
• Rosenberg, T. (2013) ‘Turning Education Upside Down - The New York Times’, The New York Times, [online] Available from: http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/10/09/turning-education-upside-down/?_r=1 (Accessed 5 September 2015).