A 'Flipped' Intro Lesson!

Although I attended several wonderful sessions at this summer's American School Counselor Association Conference, I must say that the most intriguing was Dr. Erin Mason & Franciene Saben's session on 'Flipping Lessons'. You can view their Presentation Slides here.

'Flipping' was started in the early 2000's by two high-school science teachers, Johnathan Bergmann and Aaron Sams. But don't flip out just yet, 'flipping' isn't meant to be complicated or make life harder for you-it's actually meant to make better use of your time and allow for more meaningful conversations with your students! In a nutshell, 'flipping' is:

1. Technology-based Content Delivery

2. Face-to-face Follow-up

Every year, my School Psychologists and I spend many hours visiting each classroom to present a lesson that engages students and explains the similarities and differences between our roles. Considering I have one K-5 building and one K-3 building, that comes out to about 45 half-hour lessons! Although we love seeing the kids and getting a little crazy with whatever our theme is that year, it's exhausting! It also takes time away from our many other responsibilities.

That being said, I could not wait to get to work on 'flipping' my lessons for the year! Together, my School Psychologists and I selected a theme and drafted a script of the main points we wanted to cover. We then recorded several clips of ourselves presenting the CONTENT (mixed in with a little humor, of course!) For this, I used one of our schools Flip Video Cameras.  Afterwards, I chose to utilize iMovie to put all of the clips together in sequential order, as well as add music, text, and transitions.  I then uploaded the completed video(s) to Vimeo. 

So here it is-take it easy on our acting abilities ;)

IVES-School Counselor & School Psychologist Intro from Erin Rebling on Vimeo.

Next, I sent an email to staff that included the link to the appropriate video. Within the email, I stated that they had two weeks to show this approximately 6-minute video to their students, at whatever time worked best for them! This could be during morning meeting, snack breaks, before lunch, at the end of the day, etc. Following this two week period, my School Psychologist and I will be making 10-15 minute visits to each of the classrooms to check for understanding and allow students to ask questions. This FACE-TO-FACE FOLLOW-UP must occur in order to truly 'flip' a lesson! 

So far, we have gotten great feedback on the videos from students and staff. One great benefit of 'flipping' this lesson is that we can post it on our websites, social media accounts, etc., for students to watch again at home with their families, or to simply enjoy watching our shenanigans again. :)

I am looking forward to 'flipping' many more lessons in the future, and hope this has inspired you to do the same!