Flipping the classroom

Anne Cathrine Gotaas, Sandvika Further Education College, Norway

This flipped classroom concept is simple: students study the theory at home and use classroom time to put their newly gained knowledge into practice. Anne Cathrine delivers flipped classroom teaching to her students by creating videos, animations and other resources and adding them to the relevant itslearning course.

The videos are embedded into a test and students must answer one or two questions after watching the video. The student will then see if she has understood the video or if she has to watch it again. This technique also means that Anne Cathrine can see which areas have caused problems for her students – and she can prepare her classroom lessons accordingly. She can also track which students have watched or read the materials and which haven’t.

Create your own video games

Lindsey Dudaniec, Accrington Academy, UK

Students at Accrington Academy have the chance to create their own computer game through the ICT09 – MISSION GO course, all through itslearning. All materials for the course, including tutorials, notes and videos as well as assignments and discussions, are on itslearning.

The course also includes a number of extension materials that students can study if they complete assignments early – or want to do more work on their game in their spare time.

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Recorded lessons on your mobile phone

Magnus Söderbom, Mariebergsskolan Primary School, Sweden

In order to give students an extra way to learn, Magnus records each lesson using a Dictaphone and posts the MP3 file on itslearning, along with lesson notes, local curriculum plans and other relevant material. The students can listen to the lesson recording directly on itslearning, or download the file and listen to it on their MP3 players or phones.

The files are ideal for students who missed the lesson or prefer to learn by listening – and can be used by any student as revision material. A survey of students revealed that most feel they are helped by the ‘extra service’ and many share the recording with their parents so their parents know what they’ve learnt at school.

E-learning on a beauty therapy course

Becki Bork, Image Department, Hopwood Hall College, UK

The Beauty Therapy department at Hopwood Hall College delivers all its courses using itslearning, allowing teaching and training to be done anywhere, anytime.

All course material, including classroom hand-outs, presentations and paperwork, are uploaded onto itslearning so the students can re-cap at their own pace. Live demonstrations of treatments are filmed and then made available for students to watch as many times as necessary. Students take part in online discussion forums on itslearning to discuss topics that they are covering in their course, and web links for subjects are made available for students to research further. There is also an animated avatar (Voki) on itslearning that talks the students through the tasks, what they need to cover and much more!

Not only does itslearning enhance the collaborative nature of online learning, it also motivates students to be much more engaged and to take more responsibility for what they’re learning.

Teach yourself explaining sequences

Roger Carpenter, Tiffin Girls' School, UK

Faced with the problem of teaching tricky numerical concepts to two groups of students at the same time, Roger decided to use explaining sequences to encourage the students to take responsibility for their own learning. So, how does it work?

An explaining sequence enables the teacher to set up a number of ‘steps’ that the student must work through. For each step, the teacher adds an explanation (which can include video, text, PDFs, etc.) and a concept check question. The student reads the theory and answers the question. If they get the answer right, they move onto the next step. If they get it wrong, they get a hint. If they still get it wrong, they work through the material again or ask their teacher for help.

Digital leaders: students help teachers with ICT

Anne Neal, The Merton Primary School, UK

Like many schools, the students at The Merton Primary School often have better ICT skills than their teachers. So the school created Digital Leaders, a group of students who are ready and willing to help teachers with ICT issues during their lunch breaks. Anne wrote a ‘job advertisement’ and asked students to visit the Digital Leaders course in itslearning to apply. She then chose six students to be Digital Leaders. Now, when staff want help with ICT, they add their request to a Google spreadsheet on the Digital Leaders course – and each morning the Digital Leaders check the spreadsheet to see which teacher they need to help at lunchtime.

The general response to the idea has been so positive that the school is now looking to start an ICT club, and two of the Digital Leaders are creating a video to help pupils who want to do video editing (the video will eventually be added to the new ICT Club course).

The student itslearning charter

Marie-Hélène Barrault, Ecole de Rouvray Saint Denis, France

Students at Ecole de Rouvray Saint Denis primary school use itslearning as a digital workspace to gather information about their school work, communicate with students and teachers, find learning resources and complete their work. In order to make sure all students use the workspace correctly, students in four classes worked together to draft a Charter of Use for all students to follow.

The Charter includes not only what students use itslearning for, but also how they should use it. For example, “I use email to talk nicely to friends” and “I tell the teacher about any messages that do not respect this regulation”. The Charter also includes penalties for students who break the rules.

A digital forum for differentiated learning

Jelmer Evers, UniC (secondary education), the Netherlands

For Jelmer, itslearning is the glue that holds his varied teaching resources together. Using itslearning, he’s able to deliver a flipped classroom model that mixes videos, textbooks, and various Web 2.0 tools – and enables students to customise their own education.

Students attend class with Jelmer for one hour a week. The rest of the time, they work their way through resources he’s gathered in his itslearning course. There are no set ways of progressing, so students make their own choices as to how they work. As well as discussion forums, videos and textbooks, Jelmer uses web tools such as HootCourse, Mindomo, Storify and Twitter (through a hashtag feed that’s integrated into the course dashboard).

Assessment for learning made easy

Geir Dahlberg, Hønefoss Further Education College, Norway

Hønefoss Further Education College is determined to make assessment for learning work for its students, and has developed a simple system to put the theory into practice throughout the entire school.

Students enter every piece of work for assessment through the itslearning assignment tool. Then, when the teacher gives feedback, they use the comment field to enter 1-3 things that the student did well, and 1-3 ways in which the student can improve. These comments are included in the student grade book, giving teachers a quick overview of all the assessments and comments for each student. This improves the quality of student/teacher conversations during the term – and means students always have a clear idea of how they can get better.

The first book on famous Dutch people in Spanish?

Mieke Timmers, Catholic School Hoofddorp, the Netherlands

The students in this Dutch secondary school are collaborating on a book about famous Dutch people – in Spanish. Run by the school’s Spanish teacher, this ambitious project should result in (possibly) the first Spanish book on the subject.

Each week, every student uploads a new article to the Spanish itslearning course. The articles are automatically checked for cases of plagiarism, and the teacher then corrects the article before uploading it again for the students to see and review. After 9 weeks of writing, the articles will be put together and published as a book.

Improving behaviour among disaffected students

Dee Kerwick-Chrisp, Greys Education Centre, UK

Greys Education Centre takes the students that other schools deem too hard to teach. With these students, encouraging good behaviour is usually vital to successful learning.

Once a week, every student meets with a teacher to set their behaviour goals, which are then added to the student’s individual learning plan (ILP). Then, at the end of each lesson, the class teacher refers to the student’s ILP before assigning the student a behaviour grade (using a 1-5 scale that only reflects good behaviour).

Any student with an average above 3.2 for the week can enjoy a free lesson – and the student with the best score gets a certificate. This reward system has proven extremely successful, with students competing with each other to get the best score. The student’s weekly behaviour report is also printed out and sent to their parents – and the reports are sometimes used as evidence that students are adhering to court orders.

Designing products for the real world

Hans Plekker, Spinoza Lyceum (High School), the Netherlands

Spinoza Lyceum promotes a blend of classroom teacher and projects to encourage students to work independently. In one of these projects, Hans asks his students to create a product that could be used in real-life. The student then takes the idea from concept and design through to construction and marketing – and the entire process is managed through itslearning.

In essence, students use itslearning like a project management tool and the course page gives them a full overview of the project, including project phases and deadlines. All work is uploaded to itslearning, enabling Hans to monitor his students’ progress, assess their work and give quick feedback.