Flipping the Biostatistics Classroom, With a Twist

For ecology faculty members not directly involved in pedagogical research, it can be daunting to decide among the many new tools and approaches available to improve teaching and learning. Problem-based learning (Edens 2000), blended learning (Garrison and Kanuka 2004), case-based teaching (Herreid et al. 2011), active learning (Bean 2011), MOOCs (Daniel 2012), and flipping the classroom (Bergmann and Sams 2008, Bergmann and Sams 2012, Fulton 2012, Tucker 2012, Bishop and Verleger 2013, Herreid and Schiller 2013) are just a few of the new methods being evaluated and implemented in educational theory and practice. Flipping the classroom is the process of moving traditional lecture content teaching to videos watched by students outside the class, while simultaneously moving activities such as homework and group projects into the classroom (Bergmann and Sams 2008, 2012). At our university, replacement of traditional introductory biology lectures with recorded “talking head” videos in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s was an abysmal failure, one that damaged the reputation of our department long after the practice was abandoned. How does “flipping the classroom” differ from this? In what context might it make sense to move content delivery outside the classroom, while moving homework and group exercises into the traditional lecture period?