Brainstorming the Ideal Class Rhythm

A major part of GIFT training has been learning various active learning strategies: think-pair-share, ambassador groups, peer instruction, etc. For the past two days we’ve spent a good bit of time talking about “flipped classrooms”. This has made me speculate about what my ideal class “rhythm” would be, i.e., the pattern of activities that would typify before-class, in-class, and after-class learning. In this post I’m going to lay out what I think my ideal class rhythm would be, and will likely blog later about the application and execution of this rhythm in planning an actual class session, probably revolving around approximate inference. While this post is meant to be fairly general, I’ve only been thinking about the rhythm for Intro to Artificial Intelligence; if I was teaching a seminar-style class or a psychology class, different decisions might be made.

Before Class

The “flipped classroom” necessarily depends on students learning the basics of the material by themselves before class. In class n-1, I would provide students with a list of relevant chapter sections / subsections, a list of links to video lectures covering the same content, and a set of concepts they should be familiar with before class. I would then require them to post one question on Piazza with respect to a concept they don’t fully understand, and to respond to two other students’ posts offering explanations as to those other students problems. This serves two purposes. First, it ensures that students have a venue for asking about material they are having trouble understanding. Second, by making students explain things to each other, it helps them learn the material better.

During Class

At the beginning of class n, I would have a low-stakes quiz on the basic concepts of the reading. This provides additional incentive for students to do the assigned reading, and provides me with information so that in future iterations of the class I will be able to better portion the readings and lectures. Finally, research shows that the act of taking a quiz or test is a powerful learning tool.

I would then use a combination of small-group discussions, group exercises and games to try to provide a concrete (and engaging) analogue to the course material. After each exercise, I would have a peer-evaluation-style question to ensure that students have actually learned what the exercise tried to show. Any conversations that need to be side-boarded due to time constraints I would immediately post to Piazza. This would both allow students a venue to discuss the topic after class and serve as an accountability measure for me: if I (the professor) say that I’ll look something up and get back to students on it, then having the question posted to Piazza forces me to respond to it (outside of class time) and shows the students that I’m good for my word. Finally, I would go over material left unresolved from students’ Piazza questions and tell students what they’ll need to do for class n+1.

After Class

In addition to the readings necessary for class n+1, students will of course have regular homework assignments. I see these being assigned on a weekly basis (meaning no homework beyond reading between Tuesday and Thursday), and falling into four categories:

1. essay questions asking students to connect material to topics from previous units,
2. essay questions asking students to brainstorm extensions to algorithms and heuristics in order to account for nuances of new problems,
3. mathematically substantial proofs and derivations, and
4. coding assignments requiring students to actually implement the algorithms they’ve learned about.

All four of these are types of questions which I feel substantially extend the material covered in class; they don’t just check whether students know the facts, but assess the degree to which they’re able to apply, extend and analyze the course material.

One final caveat: I’m still not entirely sure how to differentiate between what should be a homework problem and what should be a test problem. I’m anticipating that test material will be a combination of homework categories 1-3 and the types of questions asked on quizzes. Time will tell!