22 / ’southern
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flipping. In a large-enrollment
physics class at Vanderbilt University,
a flipped group had increased student
engagement and better scores on a
multiple choice test than a control
group. At San Jose State University, a
flipped engineering section had higher
mid-term exam scores than traditional
sections, even though the flipped class
took a harder test.
Data like that is just one part of why
the flipped classroom trend is here to
stay. The practice grew out of K-12
classrooms, where teachers are under
increasing pressure to reach students
with a wide range of abilities in a
limited time.
“As more and more students grow up
with flipped classrooms, they’re going
to expect the same when they get to
college,” said BSC Associate Professor
of Education Dr. Louanne Jacobs.
“They’re used to experiencing
education this way. We have such
great teachers here already. This is just
about quality teaching.”
Humanities graduates may be
scratching their heads, as many
What’s a MOOC?
If you’ve been anywhere near a college campus lately,
you’ve probably heard a conversation about MOOCs, the
shorthand for “massive open online courses.” It’s maybe
the hottest trend in higher ed, with institutions from MIT to
the Museum of Modern Art offering these large, free, online
courses, usually not for credit. Many are offered through
companies, such as Coursera and Udacity, that organize the
infrastructure for the faculty who teach them.
Part of the goal of MOOCs is to share the information
that often gets locked up in the towers of academe with the
rest of the world. Because they’re free and entirely online,
a broad range of people can access the classes, even if they
A
MOOC
, not a moose…
The Mondopad allows Lewis-Ferrell to shift seamlessly from Microsoft’s PowerPoint to
the Internet for a visual field trip.
