Henry Roux de Bézieux is the director of VICTORIA’s English in France and in 2012, Henry and his team embarked on their fascinating journey into the cyclical, flipped classroom experience. Here’s how his team implemented the blended Touchstone and Viewpoint courses and his advice for others about to start their own journey.
In 2012, VICTORIA’S English was made up of one private language school. They were using a primitive version of flipped learning to teach English. 5 years later, their network has grown to 25 schools, teaching English to 10000 adult students a year. So, what has – or has not – been achieved in those 5 years?
A flipped 4 way blend for General English
Robert Talbert (from Flipped Learning Global Initiative) defines flipped learning as a pedagogical approach, in which first contact with new concepts moves from the group learning space to the individual learning space. This takes place in the form of structured activity and results in a dynamic, interactive learning environment, where the educator guides students as they apply concepts and engage creatively in subject matter. So, what does this actually look like at VICTORIA’S English ?
Firstly, the school precisely positions students. This is so that they can create a unique programme that suits their needs. Students then work through 6 to 24 Touchstone and Viewpoint units with the following study framework:
- The student studies the Touchstone online course to discover the contents of the unit (vocabulary, grammar, speaking strategies, etc.). 3 to 6 hours per unit.
- The student makes use of the Touchstone workbooks to practise what they have learnt. 1 to 2 hours per unit.
- The student receives personalised coaching and tuition from one of their teachers (1 on 1 or in a very small group of 4, maximum). 1 to 3 hours per unit.
- The student joins in a number of conversation activities in small groups (8 students maximum) to practise speaking. 1 to 4 hours per unit.
A motivated student with sufficient availability will go through this whole cycle at least once a week to once a fortnight.
Getting the processes right
Imagine a language school with 100 to 200 students simultaneously studying English in line with their own individual schedules. Each student is required to book his or her classes roughly one week ahead and nobody knows in advance exactly when a student is going to be available. They also don’t know how fast he or she will want to progress at any given time. It sounds like a nightmare, right?
For VICTORIA, no piece of software was up to fixing this mammoth task . So, they developed their own cycle, named ERP (appropriately referred to as Benjee, after Queen Victoria’s favourite Prime Minister). Benjee makes it easy to provide students with the sense of freedom that they need, whilst also helping the school to provide a streamlined and cost effective service.
Getting the people right
Independent, motivated, self starting and computer savvy students perform wonderfully in the flipped classroom setting. They take ownership of their course and ownership of their progress. They come to the teacher’s classes with plenty of questions, enjoy the small group community atmosphere and revel in the freedom of being able to review certain sequences 3 times and skip others entirely. Their progress is typically faster and their motivation levels higher than in traditional classroom settings.
On the other hand, flipped classrooms have proved too challenging for less motivated, less able and less available students. Students who usually shy away from direct teacher contact tend to miss the anonymity of large groups. What’s more, some students find that working on their computer is lonely and boring. Flipped classrooms are quite a challenge for all those students who don’t really want to learn English but feel like globalisation is forcing them to. Some students have a definite idea about what a learning environment should look like… and flipped classrooms are not part of that idea.
Over the years, VICTORIA have designed programmes to ensure that people who can’t adapt to the reality of the flipped classroom are provided with interesting alternatives. Flipped classrooms also change student / teacher relationships. Gone is the relative stability of traditional teaching and the apparent prestige of being “ze teacher” (please pronounce with a French accent). Students question their teachers and get them to address any number of issues they are personally interested in. It’s a real challenge and some teachers do not want to hear of it. Having said that, most teachers end up liking this new role better than the old one and find it more interesting.
Getting the atmosphere right
Flipped classroom courses work well when they are student centred enough and students enjoy their time at school. Part of the arrangement is getting the atmosphere right. If people enjoy the face to face classes, they will want to come again and again. But they can only do so if they have completed their homework online. So in a sense, the flipped classroom arrangement ensures that the homework gets done, because it gets done before (rather than after) the class takes place.
It’s a virtuous circle. Students come to school, having already done the tough bit, the online homework. They come to school to enjoy themselves and do what doesn’t get done online – the speaking bit. And that transforms their institution into a smooth and happy training machine.
If you want to learn more about the flipped classroom, have a read of Ian Cook’s article, called ‘The original flipped classroom?’!