Nouira Chahira

Which competencies do students, teachers, and service units need for implementing the Inverted Classroom concept?

For almost a year now, I have been involved in a project that promotes collaborative learning, interaction and peer learning in larger classes at our university. As an educational technologist, together with a team of experts in teaching and learning, I support teaching staff interested in adapting their teaching methods to create spaces for students to learn in collaboration with their peers, to discuss issues before and after getting into the lecture halls and develop relevant skills to the subjects they study.

My work primarily focuses on understanding what teachers need to carry out their teaching activities in order to help them designing and adapting learning and teaching formats and methods.

In many cases, the inverted classroom model (ICM) is a good choice as it offers a more student-centered approach, promotes collaborative learning and can offer good opportunities to debunk the myths of the benefits of lecturing, especially in times of information abundance and high accessibility.

Throughout my career in higher education, I have encountered good candidates for implementing inverted classrooms. Their ultimate decision though, was not a buy-in! While this is a mere observation and I have no data to back it up, it continues be an intriguing one and makes me wonder “why the flip?”  Why do teachers decide to stay away from a model that offers them and their students a different and more aligned learning journey?

In my experience, not everyone is keen on sharing the exact reasons behind such a decision. After all, it´s an opportunity to switch to an ICM but the teaching staff have the last word to take it or leave it. So, lately, I have been asking myself if we should dedicate our attention, or at least some of it, to the skills and competences required to make such a promising approach work instead of the skills that will be learned and part of the learning outcomes. In other words, if we were to look at everyone involved into an ICM (teachers, students, central services (learning and teaching support included)) and what the basic skills and conditions they need are, would we have more adopters?

Say for example, we make sure that the limitation big traditional lecture halls impose on discussions in small groups are NOT solely the responsibility of the teacher. Or, how can we learn from students and value their existing ways of communicating on a daily basis and integrate that in their learning journey? Can we in general distribute the load by creating a common ground for all the parties involved? Would a kind of preparatory phase, regardless of the disciplines, focusing on pedagogical, digital and design skills and competences moving from “why the flip?” as in “why should we bother?” to “why the flip?” as in “the essence behind a model that has a lot to offer!”.

I am very much looking forward take the reflection a step further during the conference. I can´t wait to shed some light on some of the observations made above and I hope to see many of you at the session and you are invited to challenge my ideas!