The Bionic Falcon: Tech Celebration: Chris Lambert flips his AP European class

Well, we are losing Chris Lambert this year as he takes the next step in his career, but I did not want to let him go without sharing one of the

innovative and exciting

things he has done this year

(

and last

)

.

You may have heard about a blended or

"flipped"

classroom

in the last year or so Chris has tried it for real in his AP European history classes. He has essentially moved the content delivery outside of class time, so he and his students can focus on problem-solving, processing, and group work during the time they are together in school.

Here's Chris's website page with all uploaded videos:

https://sites.google.com/site/cfhslambert/ap-euro-lectures

He did not mean to transform his classroom...at first

It did not begin as an attempt to transform the nature of the work they did together inside the classroom – it began, for Chris, as

means to save his voice.

After lecturing all day about the Huguenots, or the

undred

ears

ar, or the Archduke Ferdinand, he found his voice was ragged and tired – and he realize that if he recorded his lectures he would only have to perform them once.

And he could also

put them on his website where students could re

watch them whenever they needed to.

Students have more control over the pacing and delivery of content

So he began posting his lectures online, and had his students watch them at home. Students had much more control over the lectures themselves – they could pause them, to catch up on their note

taking, they could rewind them, to hear again a particularly complex or tricky passage

(76% of students surveyed said they did this most or all of the time)

, and they couldn't even listen to them slow down or speed it up.

What did the students say?

Here were some comments from students:

"I used them to take notes and understand the content. They were valuable because I was able to pause or rewind to get all of the content, whereas in class it was easy to miss something when listening to in class discussions."
"I used the videos for many different things, including studying as well as taking notes. For me, being able to go back to study and listen to the videos, was the most valuable."
"What I liked about the videos was that if you were sick (which I always am) then you would be able to watch the notes/discussions of the chapter. This was very helpful because I would be behind like in first semester. As well, when watching the podcasts I enabled the subtitles that way I could read what Mr. Lambert was saying."
"
I loved the videos and they helped me so much for I'm a slow writer and if I didn't hear something i was able to go back and hear it again."

What improvements did Chris make?

Chris asked for feedback, and changed the videos because of what students said, in several ways. In general, (surprise, surprise!) they enjoyed lectures with Chris there, in person, but there were changes they suggested that could bring the videos closer to the real thing:

make segments short - students liked the videos, but recommended that "they are shorter but there are more of them," to make it easier to sustain attention
include jokes and stories - much of what Chris's students missed in the initial podcasts were the anecdotes that he wove into each lecture, and the humor; it's difficult to weave that into a presentation with no live audience, but possible!

One clear drawback is that students can't ask their own questions and get answers in real time. However, there may be ways for kids to at least ask their questions: