The University of Utah's Independent Student Voice

The Daily Utah Chronicle

The University of Utah's Independent Student Voice

The Daily Utah Chronicle

The University of Utah's Independent Student Voice

The Daily Utah Chronicle

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Want your voice to be heard? Submit a letter to the editor, send us an op-ed pitch or check out our open positions for the chance to be published by the Daily Utah Chronicle.
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New Course Helps U Instructors Flip their Classroom

Teachers at the U are about to get schooled.

Starting this week, a new online course called “Teaching Flipped” will instruct university professors on how to teach flipped, hybrid and massive open online courses.

Zheng Zheng, associate professor of physics and astronomy lectures his universe class, Monday, August 31, 2015. Photo credit: Mike Sheehan
Zheng Zheng, associate professor of physics and astronomy lectures his universe class, Monday, August 31, 2015. Photo credit: Mike Sheehan

The free class, available on Canvas, is organized by Cynthia Furse, Donna Ziegenfuss and Alyson Froehlich. Participants in “Teaching Flipped” will learn how to produce online video content and develop learning activities for the digital classroom.

Flipped teaching is a strategy that moves typical classroom activities, such as lectures, outside of the classroom and brings outside activities, such as homework, into the classroom. In this environment, students are responsible for learning content on their own and can practice the content with the guidance of an instructor. Many teachers are opting for this style of instruction because they believe it leads to deeper knowledge of a subject.

The U received a grant from the National Science Foundation to develop this course. According to Froehlich, one of the instructors, “The class was originally intended for the STEM disciplines but evolved to include any and every discipline.”

Just about any faculty member can apply — even those from other universities worldwide — and the course can include instructors from K-12 schools.

Alexis Freudenberger, a sophomore, hopes her professors use the course to adapt their teaching styles.

“I think the hands-on activities with teachers would be really helpful to learning the subject,” she said.

The faculty coordinating this course have extensive experience with online courses and flipped teaching. Furse began flipping her classes in 2007 and has since been teaching other faculty how to flip theirs. For the past 10 years, Ziegenfuss has taught in hybrid and online formats, and she recently redesigned one of her traditional classes on qualitative research as a flip. Froehlich is a higher education instructional consultant at the Center for Teaching and Learning Excellence.

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