Flipping the Classroom: How Group Support Systems (GSS) Revolutionize Teaching and Learning

Teaching has evolved and embraced digital tools over time. This blog will explore how Group Support System (GSS) technology helps teachers and students maximize their time in the classroom. I will discuss how educators can implement a flipped classroom model using three key steps: Brainstorming, Ordering, and Voting. A GSS system enables applying all Bloom's Learning Taxonomy levels. I will conclude with essential tips for teachers and highlight six benefits of GSS technology to enhance your classes, document the schools' performance and scale up the school.

Introduction

Back in the day, seventy percent of traditional class time was spent sending a monologue by the teacher to the student. Twenty percent was spent on student interaction, and the remaining ten percent reflected their learnings. This, only sending, led to distraction and less engaged students. Students turn to their social media addiction with more ideas about their next TikTok video rather than an inspiring learning experience at school. Concepts like "flipping the classroom" are making an entrance into educational institutes.

What is "Flipping the classroom"?

According to Cynthia Brame from Vanderbilt Universitys' center for teaching, "Flipping the classroom" has become something of a buzzword in the last several years [1]. Important publications such as "How 'Flipping' the Classroom can Improve the Traditional Lecture" describe how the role of the teacher changes and how students are being more engaged by providing small assignments and focusing on the interaction through dialogues and discussion rather than the focus on monologues [2]. Brame continues, "In essence, "flipping the classroom" means that students gain first exposure to new material outside of class, usually via reading or lecture videos, and then use class time to do the more complicated work of assimilating that knowledge, perhaps through problem-solving, discussion, or debates.

In terms of Bloom's revised taxonomy (2001), this means that students are doing the lower levels of cognitive work (gaining knowledge. Memorize, repeating, listing, deduplication and comprehension) outside of class and focusing on the higher forms of cognitive work (application, analysis, synthesis, and evaluation) in class, where they have the support of their peers and instructor. This model contrasts from the traditional model in which "first exposure" occurs via lecture in class, with students assimilating knowledge through homework; thus, the term "flipped classroom."

Over the years, we have seen Group Support Systems (GSS) used as an instrument to flip the classroom. They enable students to learn and interact equally with professors and teachers, who act more as facilitators of applying the previously gained knowledge. Collaboration online or offline is possible due to innovative and scalable cloud technology, enabling flexibility to work from campus or at home. Travelling or visiting a physical lecture is not needed anymore, which positively influences CO2 emissions.

How can GSS be used to flip the classroom?

One of the biggest frustrations in meetings and classrooms is the lack of a structure or agenda. Therefore, with GSS, class time is structured around a central agenda for each lecture in a GSS system. The teacher starts first to determine their overall lecture objective. This objective can be to examine a sensitive topic such as racism at school collectively and determine upfront what to study, how to analyze, and what kind of output is desired. For example, an established and scrutinized list of viewpoints about racism at school and how to deal with that. The teacher first asks the students to read a paper at home or watch a YouTube video on the topic to prepare, list, and repeat to formulate their viewpoint on the material. In terms of Bloom, this is foundational in learning; read, digest, list, and neurologically define basic facts and concepts about the topic.

Brainstorming

In the first step of the lecture, the students may be asked to answer the conceptual question "Racism in school." This can be a brainstorming step where the students can put forward their opinion and points of view in response to the brainstorming question. The conceptual questions are not asked and answered informally by student volunteers as in traditional lectures; instead, all students must answer the conceptual question, often via handheld personal response systems or apps, which allow students to respond anonymously and will enable the instructor to see and display via the virtual projector class data immediately. If a large portion of the class answers incorrectly, students reconsider and discuss the question plenary or in small groups while the teacher encourages productive discussions. After reflection, chat, and interaction, the students answer the conceptual brainstorming question again. The instructor gives feedback and explains via displaying the outcomes on the "projector." During the session, it is a choice to allow participants to see each other's input or do it completely anonymously. The cycle can then be repeated on the same or another topic, with each process typically taking 13-15 minutes. Using the same questions or data, we coin this "Double-loop learning" [3]. Double-loop learning allows students to learn first on their insights and previous discussions and reflect and vote in multiple iterations. Hence, the group understands from its collective brain, and incubation occurs.

Note that sensitive topics in behavioral and social sciences, such as gender neutrality, racism, PTSS treatment, and mediation, increasingly require 100% anonymous voting, and the system should ensure that at all times.

Ordering

After the brainstorming step, teachers can order, categorize or split the earlier gathered brainstorming data via the Flipboard function. You can compare this to a physical whiteboard where the teacher only writes the input from the class. The students differentiate, organize, relate, question, and test the previously collected viewpoints (Bloom level; analyze). By doing this, group members justify a stand or decision. By arguing, defending, and selecting items, students learn more about evaluating what they have learned, avoiding tunnel vision, and learning about their own biases. In the case of sensitive topics, this step is crucial for students to understand how concepts and constructs relate to each other. By visualizing how connections are associated with ideas via the projector, students learn how to differentiate and better understand root causes. GSS enables discussion viewpoints of the group extensively, and as a result, a better mutual understanding is achieved. Thereby offering a silver bullet to the teacher who facilitates, structures, and documents these lectures.

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Voting

To eventually converge the diverged items, the teacher uses voting. This enables the teacher to converge to final actions, decisions, or future developments. Suppose teachers require the class to examine more quantitative stands. In that case, they can use the voting function by, for example, allocating points to an item (100 points to divide), Choose (multiple options possible), Vote (Yes or No), or Rank (from 1 to 10 or 1 to n) an item. This way, deviations can be discussed, defended, judged, critiqued, weighted, or appraised. They are allowing Blooms' Taxonomy to analyze and evaluate learnings gained from the lower level of the learning pyramid. The teacher sees which participants already submitted and contributed to the class and, via the Projector, displays this step's outcome— allowing them to flip the classroom results, whether online or offline. If certain students did not submit or have an inactive session due to doing something else on the phone, the teacher could see that, allowing them to activate passive students. This voting step is documented in the system and reported in PDF or Excel (or another format to parse it onto visualization tools or student registrar systems).

6 Benefits of GSS to flip any classroom

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Boost Interaction, Structure Courses, and Scale Up Your School with GSS Technology

GSS technology offers a comprehensive and systematic approach to educational practices, fostering a sense of consistency and recognition among your teaching staff. All staff members are encouraged to follow a unified methodology based on Bloom, ensuring that every educator is aligned in their teaching strategies. This collaborative framework promotes seamless integration within the school environment and enhances the overall educational experience.

Moreover, the resource libraries embedded within the technology are designed for easy access and reuse by teachers and students, facilitating shared learning and collaboration. These libraries are valuable repositories of instructional materials, best practices, and innovative teaching resources.

Additionally, the advanced reporting functionality provided by GSS technology enables educators to generate detailed reports on course outcomes and performance metrics effortlessly. This capability ensures that key stakeholders can produce comprehensive documentation for various purposes, such as audits, evaluation meetings, or staff meetings, at any given time. By streamlining the reporting process, GSS technology empowers educators to focus more on teaching and less on administrative tasks, ultimately enhancing the effectiveness of their educational efforts.

Conclusion

By predefining the classroom agenda upfront and determining classroom outcomes, "Flipping the classroom becomes more accessible than ever before. Only ten percent is spent on explaining the purpose of the class and the overall objectives; twenty percent is spent on moderating questions and answers, encouraging a free-flowing discussion, and ensuring everybody is heard. Most of the time is now consumed by the students answering questions, exchanging viewpoints, and arguing what they have learned.

GSS delivers a stupidly simple system for teachers to set up an agenda, run a class, and flip it. It also engages students throughout the course and allows them to log in from any device, wherever they want.

GSS technology offers a structured approach that promotes consistency among teaching staff. All members follow a uniform method, and other teachers or students can reuse the technology's libraries. The reporting function enables easy reproduction of course outputs for (accreditation) audits, evaluations, or staff meetings, allowing the school to scale up.

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Sources

[1] ??????? C. Brame, ? Flipping the classroom,” Vanderbilt University Center for Teaching. , https://cft.vanderbilt.edu/guides-sub-pages/flipping-the-classroom/., 2013.

[2] ??????? D. Berret, ?How ‘Flipping’ the Classroom Can Improve the Traditional Lecture,” 19 Feb 2012. [Online]. Available: https://www.chronicle.com/article/how-flipping-the-classroom-can-improve-the-traditional-lecture/.

[3] ??????? C. Argyris, ?Double-loop learning, teaching, and research.,” Acad. Manag. 1(2), vol. 1(2), pp. 206-218, 2002.