TwitterFlipping the Classroom: Social Media for Independent Learning
1. TwitterFlipping the Classroom:
Social Media for Independent Learning
Terese Bird and Alison Fox
University of Leicester
ALT-C 2015 Manchester UK 8 September 2015
2. Wyggeston and Queen Elizabeth I
College Lesson Study Project 2014
• “In a sixth-form college setting to what extent do teachers,
working collaboratively, perceive that the use of Twitter as a
pedagogical tool can support student learning?” (Fox, 2015)
• College teachers supporting each other to use Twitter to
enhance teaching
4. AS & A Level students needed
independent learning skills
• The school
• high-achieving
• mobile phone ban
• The teachers
• some never used social media
• some used only personally
• some firmly using social media in teaching
• The students
• some liked the idea of using social media for learning
• some did not
5. Independent Learning
• “Independent study is a process, a
method and a philosophy of education: in
which a student acquires knowledge by
his or her own efforts and develops the
ability for inquiry and critical
evaluation.” (Candy, 1990)
• Higher Education Academy (2014)
Independent learning, York.
• Meyer, B., Haywood, N., Sachdev, D. and
Faraday, S. (2008) What is independent
learning and what are the benefits for
students?, London.
6. Supporting the intervention
Dr Fox and I explored with teachers the use of social
media especially Twitter and notion of flipped classroom
7. The Flipped Classroom
began in high schools
• “Instead of having the lecture
in school and do homework at
home, have the lecture at
home, and do the homework
in school”
• High school chemistry
teachers Bergmann and Sams
recorded their lectures 2007
(Bergmann & Sams, 2012)
• Clintondale High School
(Rosenberg, 2013)
• Video is the preferred format
http://www.flippedhighschool.com/
8. What is flipped learning and
how can social media do it?
• “pedagogical approach in which direct
instruction moves from the group learning space
to the individual learning space, and the
resulting group space is transformed into a
dynamic, interactive learning environment where
the educator guides students as they apply
concepts and engage creatively in the subject
matter.” (Flipped Learning Network, 2014)
11. How our teachers
proceeded
English Gov’t & Politics Maths
• Set a task and chose
supporting resources
• Tweeted resources
• Supported students
with Twitter in class,
to do the task
• Planned a day to
debate
• Tweeted material
pertaining to each
side so Twitter
helped prepare to do
the debate
• Realised students
needed to follow her
first
• Set an open-ended
task for students to
find resources toward
findings, using Twitter
• After this task,
continued tweeting
exam revision and
other helps
13. Students’ use of teachers’
tweets -> independent learning
• Behavioural prompt: “If you see a teacher’s tweets then you get the incentive ‘Oh let me
start doing some work’. It is good to warn you, to give more information and to help you
research.”
• Push technology: “With emails you have to login to something, with Twitter it is just there
as soon as you pick up your phone.”
• Springboard to research: Student liked the fact links a good starting point for research,
a good springboard.
• Collaboration: Student commented it would be a good idea for them to find their own
links and share them too.
• Lesson reinforcement: Wanted “further reading after lessons through a link to website
or maybe a particular question or picture.. regularly to help you understand the lesson
better”
• Exam prep: “When you are looking at past papers and need an explanation for
particular questions you don’t really understand, the interaction between you and your
teachers would make it quicker than having to come all the way here.”
• Caution: addictive: “I don’t want to [use it] because loads of people are addicted to it.. “
14. Teachers’ views of tweeting
• Flipped learning: “We can get them in the habit of pre-learning because I think
the Twitter thing was partially why we’re interested in this, but the idea that they
would do some of the basic leg work before we get to the lessons and then we
can spend more time discussing ideas and putting theories to practice when
we analyse texts in English language or, if it’s for literature, discussing how an
argument is developed by a critique and then seeing whether it matches with our
interpretation of text there. So getting them to work at a higher level and really
preparatory for university…”
• Good use of social media: “I’ve had quite a few students who, they now use Twitter
and they follow economists and that’s all.”
• Draw them to the VLE/other material:“It’s also good I think for getting them to look
at our Moodle page. A couple of the links were on Moodle. So they opened up the
Tweet and then it took them back to the Moodle page and some of them were
actually quite surprised at what was on there.
• September Start:“From September with all your classes it’s, ‘Hey. First lesson. This
is what we do. You need to be following or bookmark me by tomorrow morning’, sort
of approach. That’s what I find works. It’s like the first piece of homework.”
• It’s for the A* students too: “Concerned that the more able students, not all on
Twitter, are yet sure that it will benefit them.”
15. Independent learning
• More able students:
• select information
• access content
• critically engage
• Lower attaining students:
• remind and support revision
• Multimedia resources attractive
• Demonstrate interest in subject beyond the syllabus —for personal statement
• “…encourages students to read more outside of lessons and can also be used to
stretch the more able.”
16. Conclusions
Teacher-supported use of social media
by students is…
• Successful flipped learning
• Successful independent learning
• Still being used and developed
20. References
• Bergmann, J. and Sams, A. (2012) Flip your classroom: reach every student in every class every day,
Washington, DC, International Society for Technology in Education.
• Candy, P. C. (1990) ‘Self-Direction for Lifelong Learning. A Comprehensive Guide to Theory and
Practice.’, Jossey-Bass, 350 Sansome Street, San Francisco, CA 94104-1310., [online] Available from:
http://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED353470 (Accessed 7 September 2015).
• Flipped Learning Network (2014) ‘Flipped Learning Definition’, Flipped Learning Network Website,
[online] Available from: http://flippedlearning.org/domain/46 (Accessed 4 September 2015).
• Fox, A. (2015) Developing Twitter use for Teaching: Report of Wyggeston and Queen Elizabeth I
College Lesson Study Project 2014, Leicester.
• Fox, A. and Bird, T. (2015) A social media charter, Leicester, UK, [online] Available from: http://
www2.le.ac.uk/colleges/ssah/news/smile-2014-event/charter (Accessed 5 September 2015).
• Higher Education Academy (2014) Independent learning,York.
• Jisc (2015) Quick guide - Developing students’ digital literacy, [online] Available from: http://
digitalcapability.jiscinvolve.org/wp/files/2014/09/JISC_REPORT_Digital_Literacies_280714_PRINT.pdf
(Accessed 25 June 2015).
• Meyer, B., Haywood, N., Sachdev, D. and Faraday, S. (2008) What is independent learning and what
are the benefits for students?, London.
• Rosenberg, T. (2013) ‘Turning Education Upside Down - The New York Times’, The New York Times,
[online] Available from: http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/10/09/turning-education-upside-
down/?_r=1 (Accessed 5 September 2015).
