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Stumbled across this infographic about “flipped classrooms” today. Nice enough.

I’m still not sure how I feel about the concept of the flipped classroom … or at least, its typical implementation. My major concern is the assumptions made about students’ time. If a student is taking seven courses, and all seven teachers decide to “flip,” that student could end up with nearly seven additional hours of work at home. No one should have to work a 14-hour day. I realize that’s likely the extreme scenario, but it’s not impossible. And even a more-likely addition of three hours is still asking too much.

I absolutely agree we should take advantage of the variety of excellent and varied resources online and use them to support instruction. I agree that the power to pause and re-watch is helpful and empowering. I agree that, often times, an engaging video, article, or other resources is going to be a far better alternative than what I can present from the front of the classroom. I just don’t think any of that justifies off-loading that onto students’ already over-booked schedules.

I’d prefer a way to achieve more by doing less, and using the best, engaging online resources to support that. I’ll have to write more about this last concept later, but it’s connected to coyote teaching.

This is her artwork celebrating All Hallow’s Read, the “new tradition” Neil Gaiman started in 2010 of giving someone a scary book on Halloween.

Happy Halloween!

We’ve forgotten that assessment doesn’t require measurement, and, moreover, that the most valuable forms of assessment are often qualitative

A good teacher knows, within a few months of working closely with students, where their strengths are and where they need to improve. And this can be known without any “quantitative measurements.” But the lack of such measurements doesn’t mean that assessment hasn’t been happening.