How am I making this work?

In the past few weeks I've had the opportunity to talk to a few groups about my flipped classroom.  First, I spoke at our "Fired Up" conference, which is a conference for all the student teachers in the area.  It was a great experience, and they asked a lot of great questions.  Many of them revolved around how I am actually getting this whole thing to work.

About 2 weeks after that, I attended EdCamp GR, where I led a session on the flipped classroom (with the help of another teacher from the area...thanks @davidfouch).  That session also went well, and a lot of questions revolved around how the flipped classroom looks different to every teacher.  Personally, I think that is one of the best (and most challenging) parts to a flipped classroom.  You can make it your own.  That, however, is also one of the most difficult parts to explaining a flipped classroom because there isn't a one size fits all approach.  That being said, I think it really helps to see examples of how it could be done, to give you a starting point.  Therefore, I'm dedicating this post to how I actually organize/run my math time.

Before I even get into the system I use, I want to mention that I have been working hard on having "I can" statements that go with every unit.  I refer to those statements throughout the videos, discussions, etc.  They are also always posted on my classroom wall.

To start out, the students all go home with a calendar that we have filled in together that maps out when each student should do each video.  They can certainly move faster than our schedule, but not slower.  They also get a cover sheet that has our guiding questions, required videos and required problems on it.

Each night (or every other night) the students come to class having completed their WSQ's.  Basically, they Watch the video (and take notes), Summarize the video (answer the guiding questions) and write an example Question...get it, WSQ.  We host our videos on our Youtube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/kh5thgrademath  Here's one example of a video for those of you interested in checking them out.  We try to add humor into our videos...if at all possible.  I found that throwing in little songs at the end & not being afraid to be goofy helps a lot (for an example, tune in to 8 min 40 sec).

Here is an example of what the guiding questions looks like to the students.  I try to make the guiding questions some of the higher levels of Bloom's Taxonomy.

After they have their WSQ's done, they sign up to meet with me.  I typically meet with a group of 4-5 students.  The first thing they do is check each other's answers from the video.  If anyone got something different from the group, it's their job to help them figure out what they did wrong, and why it was wrong.  This is also a great way for me to tell who was just writing down what I write, and not really doing any practice.  After they do that, they call me over to discuss the guiding questions.  This has helped me a lot in regards to time management, otherwise I'd spend all my time in discussions, and no time working on practice problems.

Once they get the all clear from me, they work on their practice problems (these are what used to be homework).  They self correct their answers and then can quiz on the learning goals.  I keep track of this is a couple of ways.  First, I have my master copy of who's done what (if I ever lost this I would be in major trouble!).  The date of the discussion is marked on the chart.  Once they take a quiz, it is either marked with pink or green (pink means they didn't pass, green means they did).  

Each child also has a file folder where I keep all their quizzes.  At the end of a unit I send it all home for them to study from.  I also have a file for each learning goal, so the students can access the quizzes when they need them.

I think the last organizational tid-bit I have for you is my folder system.  I have a folder where I keep my master highlighted page, as well as all the answer keys to the quizzes.  I've found that having an answer key easily accesible makes getting the students immediate feedback much more doable.

I realize this is a lengthy post, hopefully it is helpful too!