Flipping the classroom: teachers' voices

Abstract

The new Academic Communication course for Business and Economics students at the Centre for Applied English Studies, HKU is the first of its kind at the Centre. The course has been designed with a ‘flipped classroom’ approach at the core of the learning process with a key focus on providing both in-class and out-of-class situations for the motivation to improve academic writing. Blending out-of-class materials and ‘lectures’ with collaborative, learner-focused, student-led in-class tasks has replaced a more traditional approach that both students and teachers have previously been familiar with. A student taking an active role in the learning process has been identified as something that is motivational. Black and Wiliam (1998), for example, argue that achieving motivation within the classroom is associated with all learners gaining a sense of achievement, rather than encouraging students to compete with one another when extrinsic rewards are involved. Promoting learning situations where students take an active role in their own and peers’ learning is an essential feature in this course. In this presentation, we outline the assessment for learning underpinnings of the approach, and the need for the Learning Management System, Moodle as two main components of the course for 2nd year Business and Economics students. We then use these key elements to investigate the course from the perspective of the teacher. Highlights, challenges and issues of the approach and the course will be shared.