Below, Dr. Jeremy Orloff and Dr. Jennifer French Kamrin describe why they decided to include supplementary materials for teachers on the OpenCourseWare site for 18.05 Introduction to Probability and Statistics.
The original concept behind OCW was to make class materials available to teachers. It turned out that most of the users are learners, but there are still a significant number of teachers who make use of the materials. We hope the materials for teachers give them a sense of the high level of coordination needed for team teaching in a flipped classroom and some ideas on how to go about it. Furthermore, the heart of 18.05 is the classroom experience. We can’t repeat this online, but since we have already produced these additional materials, why not share them in the hope they will illuminate the classroom experience?
It can be challenging for new math teachers to begin teaching using active learning techniques because many have never experienced active learning in their own classes as a student. Since we know everyone learns by example, we hope that describing the organization of the class, the flow, and the timeline will help others develop their own active learning classes.
