I make extensive use of videos in the courses I teach. I find the carpentries
method to be not suitable for novices (ie the starting from scratch group) for
the reasons given - there is no context on which to hang the material they are
given. The videos typically will be taking them through the introduction parts
- what is a list, how do you work with it etc.) and they then have exercises
('labs') in iPython notebooks. They make extensive use of the videos for
reference during their labs which typically are started in class and then
homework to be worked through during the week.
This is mid undergraduate (Scottish level 2 and 3, level 4 is honours).
Postgrads are typically selected as being more able students so they are better
able to handle the intensity and use scaffolding better.
I like the carpentries approach but it is not suitable for all cases, and I
also like to see these developments springing up from it. The benefit of
carpentries is that they give the students two things - the knowledge that a
certain thing can be done, and the knowledge and confidence that it is within
their ability. These allow/permit/encourage a student to then take the further
steps in learning as they need to.
..d
Dr David Martin
Senior Lecturer in Bioinformatics
College of Life Sciences
University of Dundee
________________________________
From: Discuss <[email protected]> on behalf of Ethan
White <[email protected]>
Sent: 16 March 2018 15:28:30
To: Greg Wilson; Software Carpentry Discussion
Subject: Re: [Discuss] inverted carpentries?
I think this is a really interesting idea and I tried this a few years back in
the university classroom in my Carpentries' style courses (i.e.,
https://www.programmingforbiologists.org/ &
http://www.datacarpentry.org/semester-biology/). I found that the classic
approach of watching videos in advance and then jumping straight into exercises
in class was great for the top 20% of students. They had basically processed
things successfully on the first exposure (the videos) and enjoyed getting to
immediately apply it. It did not work as well for the bottom 50% of students.
Watching the videos had given them a useful first exposure, but lacking the
well developed scaffolding to hang that information on it had already started
to fade and they couldn't immediately apply it. They wouldn't speak up about
not getting it quickly enough and would struggle.
As a result I ended up switching to teaching my university classes on this just
like we teach workshops, but with just a little more assumption of having seen
the basic idea before in readings/videos. Students view the material in
advance. I then provide a brief overview of the first topic and show one or two
examples. The students then work on an example that builds on what I just
demonstrated and we iterate this way throughout the class period. This feels a
little slower to the top 20% of students, but I've found it to be more
effective for everyone else.
This is also in a fairly ideal setting for this kind of approach in that the
students are graded so there is external pressure to come prepared and the
exercises we do in class count towards their grades. All of this is to say that
based on my (certainly limited) experience doing things both ways in the
university classroom that the I do, we do, you do, style of the current
workshops may end up being the best approach.
That said experimentation is always good and I like Greg's idea of a fusion as
a possible approach to letting students move at different speeds and
potentially learn different material. We should just pay attention to make sure
that this doesn't end up leaving the folks behind that need us the most.
Ethan
On 03/14/2018 07:39 AM, Greg Wilson wrote:
I like the idea of flipping the Carpentry classroom as well, but I think the
first day or two should still use our regular approach: for many learners, the
biggest benefit of a workshop is the way it helps them get over the FUD (fear,
uncertainty, and doubt) they feel whenever they try to get computers to be
useful, and I don't think that starting with videos will accomplish that.
An experiment I'd really like to try is a regular two-day workshop immediately
followed by the same people working side-by-side in the same classroom through
a series of video lessons, with the helpers still there to assist them whenever
they hit a stumbling block. Different learners could go at different speeds, or
even through (somewhat) different material, but they would still get the social
benefits of working alongside their peers, and the instructional benefits of
one-to-one assistance when most needed. I haven't been able to find anything in
the educational research literature describing this hybrid model, but I'd be
willing to bet a dollar that it would outperform either of the pure
alternatives, and I believe that at least some learners would be willing to
sign up for a week-long hands-on workshop in this format between semesters or
over the summer.
Cheers,
Greg
On 2018-03-14 12:21 AM, Kunal Marwaha wrote:
This is a sweet idea. We already have a few videos up on the website:
https://software-carpentry.org/lessons/#video
I often find (especially with free workshops) that many learners do not prepare
(a significant portion do not even install software beforehand). I would not
expect many learners to watch videos before they come to class.
I find in-person Q&A/debugging and exercises to be very useful parts of the
workshop. When I teach the collaboration part of Git ([usually in line with
this](http://swcarpentry.github.io/git-novice/08-collab/)) I have pairs of
learners do a number of exercises (collaborator clones, edits, commits &
pushes; owner pulls; owner edits, commits & pushes; both edit, commit, push at
same time; both edit same line, commit, push) at their own pace. The helpers &
I check in with each group periodically and debug / discuss concepts, conflicts
in git, and so on. This takes 30-45 minutes, and if some learners are advanced,
I ask them to explore GitHub's UI, merges, pull requests, and so on. This
environment is most similar to the "flipped classroom" that I've seen Software
Carpentry taught.
On Wed, Feb 7, 2018 at 2:07 AM, Peter Steinbach
<[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
Hi to all,
I was discussing the idea of an "inverted class room" teaching approach with a
friend of mine who is a high school teacher (he uses that based on video
recordings for his students ... just awesome AFAIK). I was hence wondering, if
people have tried to teach the carpentry lessons in this way?
This would mean, that I record some of the parts of a carpentry lesson in
video(s) (10-15 minute each) and ask the students to watch these videos before
the carpentry bootcamp! The in-presence part of the workshop is then used to do
exercises and try to fortify the content of the videos.
For me the biggest advantage of this approach is, that each learner can
overcome the initial steep learning curve given their own speed of learning -
which is a constant source of trouble when I teach.
Looking forward to your feedback -
Peter
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