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I don't mind this new way of teaching math, but on this note, I liked what Sal Khan had to say about flipping the process for school and homework. He proposed

I don't mind this new way of teaching math, but on this note, I liked what Sal Khan had to say about flipping the process for school and homework. He proposed that students should watch lectures at home with a few problems for familiarity, and that classroom time should be spent working through problems in a guided environment. This allows students to pause, rewind, rewatch, etc. the lectures and move at their own pace, while getting expert guidance on the problems in person (and not relying on parents who may not have even looked at the source material in decades).

dorchadas 9y ago
As a math teacher (Algebra II), I think this would be great. The problem is that most of my students won't go home and watch the videos. Either because they can't (lack of internet access, have to work to help support family, etc.) or are just lazy and won't. I've had to quit giving homework, even to the upper level classes, because nobody would do it. They'd just come in the next day and make excuses and have nothing done. This includes when they're homework was just to watch videos explaining problems they missed on a standardized test they took. Most just refused to watch the videos at home. It'd be great if they would watch the lectures and then be able to practice in the hour I see them daily, asking questions to clarify and such. But I can guarantee you it won't happen without a huge shift in the culture of education.
- sethammons 9y ago
  As a former inner city math teacher, I feel you. Getting students to do _anything_ outside the classroom was practically impossible. What worked for me for homework for a little while was having the students do 5 push ups for each day they missed homework in a row. I suddenly was getting 90%+ participation on students completing their homework! It was fantastic until someone told the VP, and the VP asked me if I was actually doing that, whereby they informed me that it was corporal punishment and absolutely against the rules. I could rant about that for a bit, but I'm sure you can guess what happened after the pushups stopped: homework stopped. As for the shift needed in the culture of education, I totally agree. There needs to be a shift in accountability for the students, their families, and for schools. While there were parents who hoped their kids would do well at the school where I taught, there was a pervasive home attitude of school will get you nowhere. Many of the kids had no role models in their life where they could see any value to education. One VP I knew, in a neighboring district, married into a poorer latino family. They valued hard work, but only really understood hard manual labor type efforts. He was constantly hounded as he was going through schooling by them. "Why are you wasting this time at school? Why are you not doing more to provide for my daughter? Go get a real job." After finally becoming a teacher and then a VP and making more money than any other member of the family he married into, they started to see how education could be an investment. I don't know how you do that on a scale where the majority of socio-economically depressed families and communities can be exposed to the value of education.
  - dorchadas 9y ago
    Exactly! I'm not in an inner-city area, but a rural one and there's a lot of the same problems. The poverty level of the county I teach in is 20%, and a lot of the students have to go home, and often get no support at home. And it's a clear night and day between the ones who do get support and encouragement and those who don't. Sadly, the biggest issue I see is that they want school to be, basically, training for a job and real life. So, since you'll never solve a system of equation on a job (or so they believe), they don't see why it should be taught. But, yeah, that's not getting into accountability issues with students and their families. It's a frustrating cycle, and is likely going to push me from teaching before too much longer.
  - watwut 9y ago
    I was at local selective school with students who overall did very well and ... only very few did homework or would watch videos unless it was graded or there was test. Basically, grades were instead of pushups. We did good overall, but when it comes to homework with no punishment for not being done, people skipped it.
  - dictum 9y ago
    > It was fantastic until someone told the VP, and the VP asked me if I was actually doing that, whereby they informed me that it was corporal punishment and absolutely against the rules Funny how being told to perform physical activity is seen as punishment, but having to perform complex mental activities isn't.
sethammons 9y ago
As a former math teacher, I would absolutely love this. I've been a fan of flipping the model ever since I first heard about it years ago from something on Khan Academy.

dorchadas 9y ago

As a math teacher (Algebra II), I think this would be great. The problem is that most of my students won't go home and watch the videos. Either because they can't (lack of internet access, have to work to help support family, etc.) or are just lazy and won't. I've had to quit giving homework, even to the upper level classes, because nobody would do it. They'd just come in the next day and make excuses and have nothing done. This includes when they're homework was just to watch videos explaining problems they missed on a standardized test they took. Most just refused to watch the videos at home. It'd be great if they would watch the lectures and then be able to practice in the hour I see them daily, asking questions to clarify and such. But I can guarantee you it won't happen without a huge shift in the culture of education.

sethammons 9y ago
As a former inner city math teacher, I feel you. Getting students to do _anything_ outside the classroom was practically impossible. What worked for me for homework for a little while was having the students do 5 push ups for each day they missed homework in a row. I suddenly was getting 90%+ participation on students completing their homework! It was fantastic until someone told the VP, and the VP asked me if I was actually doing that, whereby they informed me that it was corporal punishment and absolutely against the rules. I could rant about that for a bit, but I'm sure you can guess what happened after the pushups stopped: homework stopped. As for the shift needed in the culture of education, I totally agree. There needs to be a shift in accountability for the students, their families, and for schools. While there were parents who hoped their kids would do well at the school where I taught, there was a pervasive home attitude of school will get you nowhere. Many of the kids had no role models in their life where they could see any value to education. One VP I knew, in a neighboring district, married into a poorer latino family. They valued hard work, but only really understood hard manual labor type efforts. He was constantly hounded as he was going through schooling by them. "Why are you wasting this time at school? Why are you not doing more to provide for my daughter? Go get a real job." After finally becoming a teacher and then a VP and making more money than any other member of the family he married into, they started to see how education could be an investment. I don't know how you do that on a scale where the majority of socio-economically depressed families and communities can be exposed to the value of education.
- dorchadas 9y ago
  Exactly! I'm not in an inner-city area, but a rural one and there's a lot of the same problems. The poverty level of the county I teach in is 20%, and a lot of the students have to go home, and often get no support at home. And it's a clear night and day between the ones who do get support and encouragement and those who don't. Sadly, the biggest issue I see is that they want school to be, basically, training for a job and real life. So, since you'll never solve a system of equation on a job (or so they believe), they don't see why it should be taught. But, yeah, that's not getting into accountability issues with students and their families. It's a frustrating cycle, and is likely going to push me from teaching before too much longer.
- watwut 9y ago
  I was at local selective school with students who overall did very well and ... only very few did homework or would watch videos unless it was graded or there was test. Basically, grades were instead of pushups. We did good overall, but when it comes to homework with no punishment for not being done, people skipped it.
- dictum 9y ago
  > It was fantastic until someone told the VP, and the VP asked me if I was actually doing that, whereby they informed me that it was corporal punishment and absolutely against the rules Funny how being told to perform physical activity is seen as punishment, but having to perform complex mental activities isn't.

sethammons 9y ago

As a former math teacher, I would absolutely love this. I've been a fan of flipping the model ever since I first heard about it years ago from something on Khan Academy.