What If You Did Homework in Class and Took Class at Home?

Students and former students worldwide (except, we suppose, for the brainiest few) know the helpless feeling well: math homework due but no clue how to get it done.

An Ocean City High School mathematics teacher is experimenting with a new teaching model.

Using the multimedia capability of the Internet, Scot Rainear is recording traditional lessons for students to view at home. That opens classroom time for students to solve homework problems in class — where he and peers can help students who get stuck on any aspect of a problem.

Rainear, who teaches algebra and calculus classes at the high school, made a presentation last month to the Ocean City Board of Education on what he calls the "flipped classroom."

While the flipped classroom is too new to make a statistically valid comparison, Rainear told the board that he's seen average grades go up by nine points this year, and he believes the change is attributable to the new model.

Using an iPad and interactive chalkboard technology available through educreations.com, Rainear records lessons and posts them to the Internet. Students can access the lessons (and a library of past lessons) as part of their daily homework. In addition to hearing Rainear, they can see chalkboard problems being written and solved in real time.

"In the traditional approach to teaching mathematics, students would come to class and spend most of the time note-taking and listening to a teacher lecture, then try to make sense of that material through problem sets and other activities at home in isolation," Rainear writes in a frequently-asked-questions (FAQ) explainer of the concept. "The 'flip' involves the note-taking/lecture portion happening at home and hands-on practice occurring in class."

"Why not have them engage in the much more critical process of practicing the skills during class when everyone in the 'learning community' (peers and instructors) are available to assist? Wouldn’t this lead to a better chance of mastery/deeper understanding? Students don’t need to be physically in each other’s presence for note-taking/lectures (and it often leads to classroom disruptions when they are), but they really benefit from the feedback and collaboration that the learning community provides during guided practice."

Rainear says the software allows him to see who has and has not viewed the video. He also requires students to take notes during the video that he checks on a daily basis.

If the experiment this year is successful, the concept could be expanded to more classrooms.