The Flipped Classroom (8) About Office Hours

Some instructors say students don't visit them and ask course-related questions during office hours. Here is the story about my office hours.

In my last years at Metro State, I was also the department chair. Full-time faculty are required by the contract to post 10 office hours per week. With a schedule fragmented by teaching, meetings and chair duty, some of my office hours landed in nearly impossible times like early Monday mornings or late Friday afternoons. Without surprise, students hardly visited me. In fact, there was a semester when only one student visited me the whole semester, and he wasn't even there to talk about mathematics.

However, those were also the semesters when my course evaluations soared to career high and students responded in them saying I was always available for help.

​Why? Because in flipped teaching, the entire 4 hours of weekly classroom time is about helping students learn, making them practice and resolving their questions. Flipped teaching transforms all of the class meeting time into office hours.

And how would I spend my actual office hours, besides prepping or grading? I advise. I talk to students about surviving a challenging schedule, about career and grad school, about how to become a mathematician, and about anything my limited wits apply.

Next: (9) A Good Class, Guaranteed