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Comment by raphman | Hacker News Reader

This only works if you either have very intrinsically motivated students or you verify that really everyone has actually read the assigned materials before class. Otherwise, some people will turn up unprepared, you will have to explain stuff they should have gotten from the reading assignment, other students will be annoyed, students will stop preparing for class, vicious cycle.

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And then you fail them. I suspect an institute genuinely empowered to do so, where the expectations were declared up front and followed through on consistently, would fare well, after the dust settled.

As far as I can tell (based on university and high school level instruction forums) institutions increasingly are not backing the teachers that want to let kids that have earned that F fail the students.

I've heard of places where the minimum points for an assignment is 50% even if you never turn it in which is insanity.

FWIW, this isn't a problem at my German university.

This is for American schools, unfortunately. And it's not a good development.

It stems from the idea that "no child left behind" is a goal. It shouldn't have ever been.

I don't fail them usually - I expose them; and once I asked a student to leave the room because they were blatantly unprepared despite me warning them before.

My main point is: flipped classroom works great in some contexts but is no panacea and requires setting clear expectations.

Aside: as English is not my native language: "you fail them" can mean both "you give them a failing grade" and "you fail to provide the support they need", right?

> "you fail them" can mean both "you give them a failing grade" and "you fail to provide the support they need", right?

Yes, but as written the latter would not be a reasonable parse. For that sense: “you have failed them”, sure; “you are failing them”, sure; even “in acting so, you fail them”; but “and then you fail them” as an entire sentence would be very weird. The emphasis I placed on “fail” also doesn’t feel particularly compatible with that sense of the word.

As a former flipped classroom student I can attest to the effectiveness of "exposure". It requires some skill to pull off: the first time someone is exposed it should be very lenient and then get gradually harsher. The risk of embarrassment in front of the class can be a very strong motivator if utilized right.

I've been in uni classes which used this concept (about 10 years ago though). It also requires that content is given in the right size and complexity each week, otherwise there will also be people coming to class who did do their homework but didn't understand it properly and just like the people who didn't read it need full explanations.

I also felt having multiple explanations (in a regular class where you could also read the book in advance) from regular lecturers helped me in gaining understanding because having something explained in multiple ways made sure there would be at least one way, or a combination, which made it 'click'.

I always liked the regular lectures where you would be required to do some pre class reading and a smaller set of exercises the most, as you would be engaged in the class itself and would be getting repetition with different explanations.

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