Lessons Learned “Flipping” Faculty Meetings

What a difference a year makes! The Professional Development Plan I created for my learning last year was to utilize more video. More video to promote my school, communicate, and provide PD. (It sounded more formal on my written plan.) You might say that I learned a lot…….

A wolf in sheep’s clothing: My first, unpublished, attempt was just a video of me lecturing in a monotone voice, none the less.  It sounded terrible and I am not a fan of seeing myself in videos. So I have tried to stay away from this format. A lecture is a lecture whether in video or in person.

Everybody’s doing it: If you Google “Flipped Faculty Meeting” you will find some good examples and some terrible examples. Of course I am not going link to terrible examples because at least they tried. My first attempt was not that great either.

Praise in public, criticize in private: If you upload your flipped faculty meeting to YouTube, do not scold or discipline your teachers in that video. Really. I am not kidding. Don’t do that.

Do not wing it: It took five tries without a script before I decided I probably needed to have a written plan.  So I stopped and wrote it all down.

Timing is everything: Edreach Flipped Learning has some great info. At one point I listened to a short segment and it was suggested to stay under 5 min. per lesson/video. It was actually pretty tough at first. But short quick videos are much better. It’s easier for me to watch short quick videos so I thought my teachers would feel the same.

Saving grace?: Not really. At first I thought my teachers would be so thrilled because they would never have to meet with me again. I could just email them and record videos forever. Well that’s not true but you know what I mean. We HAVE TO have face to face time. We need to laugh together and have dialogue.  You can communicate anything online now. But even in the flipped classroom model students come back to the classroom to process the information.

Balancing Act: It’s just another balancing act in the unpredictable world we work in. Like our work with students, we need to keep it mixed up with adults too. One thing or the same thing all the time will get old.

Try and Try Again: Of course I tried again this year and feel a little better about the end result. Still a work in progress.

• Part 1 
• Part 2
• Part 3 was in written form and you don’t get to see it:):):)