Fall 2021: Thinking about modalities
A colleagues (If you're reading this, hi Allie!) has been asking some really good questions about how we'll return to campus, and what the experience of everyone teaching online might mean for our face-to-face (F2F) courses. In responding to one of her emails I started the following chart comparing different aspects of online, F2F, and flipped classes. I've since added a few more items.
|
Online |
F2F |
Flipped |
Timed Assessment
Logistics |
Range
of times, online, could be submitted on paper, some auto-evaluated and some
faculty evaluated. |
Specific
time and place, on paper, there could be some variation in questions among
students, faculty evaluated. |
Same
as F2F |
Timed Assessment
Questions |
By
necessity of online honesty could be more conceptual, but likely includes
computational questions. |
More
computational, but could shift towards more conceptual if more online
assessments include them. |
Same
as F2F |
Learning |
Self-taught
with reading, videos. |
Through
in-class lectures, activities. |
Partially
self-taught with readings and videos, more difficult topics in-class. |
Online
Discussions |
Bread
and butter of student and content presence |
Almost
nonexistent |
Same
as F2F |
Activities |
A good
number of online classes use activities in groups or individually |
About
1/3 of f2f instructors use group-based activities |
Unknown |
Homework |
Required
after learning, online discussions, and activities. Mostly auto-evaluated |
Required
after in-class sessions. Some auto-evaluated, some faculty evaluated. |
Required
before, after, and during in-class session. Most auto-evaluated, some faculty evaluated. |
Projects |
Used
for some courses and summative assessments. |
Very
few use projects, possibly upper-level courses and stats. |
Same as F2F |
It does seem like every implementation of the flipped classroom is a bit different, but I stuck to the common elements; some instruction and/or homework before in-class sessions, doing some (if not all) homework during class, etc. One thread you'll see running throughout is the use of auto-evaluated or faculty evaluated assessment or homework questions. This is becoming a bigger theme for faculty to consider for various reasons.
- Auto-evaluated work is by definition evaluated by a computer and answers are generated by a computer, meaning students can use computers (Desmos, Photomath, etc.) to answer them.
- Most of the time the only feedback students get with auto-evaluated work is whether the student is right or wrong. Yes, some systems provide some feedback, but as far as I am aware no system can detect what error was made and provide specific feedback on how not to make that error. Faculty evaluated work on the other hand can provide specific feedback.
- Faculty can save a huge amount of time using auto-evaluated work.
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