Getting the use of Flip in a way that actually makes sense for an educator

While I understand Microsoft may BELIEVE the Flip altered functionality still works for teachers, it does not.

Flip in Teams will not:

• Allow a link to a prompt to be posted for public use (helpful when working across institutions or with stakeholder groups)
• Integrate seamlessly into an existing LMS
• Allow students to automatically view the responses of other students without taking teacher time to moderate.
• Allow students from multiple courses to collaborate on the same prompt to reflect on cross-cutting concepts
• Allow creation of a collection of responses for public viewing (i.e. Mixtape)
• Provide automatic captioning of videos for use in research analysis

In addition, the transition away from the standalone site did not:

-Provide BULK download capabilities for teachers with data in Flip that needed preserved for research, funding, and evaluation purposes.

• Provide an alternate way for educators who are not in a position to make a decision about Microsoft Teams to still access the platform.

I'll pass these on to the development team as well. I'm mostly saddened that Microsoft has chosen to take a tool so well aligned to proper learning away from teachers.

I agree with this completely! The loss of Flipgrid has been devastating to my entire elementary Spanish program. We have now lost a way to interact with cohorts in Spain and to react and reflect on our spoken language. This decision to use Teams goes against the ease and simplicity that was essential to education. I am disheartened.

Hi Allan,

Just a note. I am new to using MS Teams, but as far as I can tell, it is not possible to add a "FLIP Tab" because FLIP is not an App. The only place I've found FLIP is when making an "Assignment," it is an option for creating your response to the Assignment (a dropdown under "+ New"). (I found it in assignments after about an hour of searching Teams App, MS 365 apps, Google, etc. One page from Google finally explained it. Most responses to variations on "FLIP video" searches are about literally rotating videos.) So that part of your instructions doesn't seem to be true, unless I'm missing something.

Incidentally, if you search Team Apps for Flip, there is an app titled Flip, with a different logo, and though the description seems somewhat similar it does not appear to be the same. Not to mention that it is only available in Spanish.

Please let me know if you have further information.

Thanks,

Aaron

Hi,

I agree with all your comments here and when you go into detail in your later reply. I've similarly been using Flip for years in university courses. I'm curious if you or any of the other FLIP users might have helpful suggestions for me. (Allan's official response wasn't really meaningful, except to message the actual development team about the problems. For instance, I can't add a "FLIP tab" because as far as I can find, FLIP isn't an "App", it's just an option under "Assignments".)

Anyway, I'm wondering about even the most basic stuff. Has anyone found a way to make a it a page students can see? And ideally "like", comment on, and make response videos. As far as I can tell "Assignments" are just submitted to the teacher (me), not posted for the rest of the "Team" (the class). The only work around I've thought of so far is to post the videos on a Team "Whiteboard", though I haven't tested whether it would work. And it would require an extra layer of unwanted work for students or for me. So, am I right that there is no way for students to interact with each other's videos?

And the assignments interface is so limited, like insanely limited, I don't see any way, as the Teacher/Admin to set any parameters for submission beyond due dates. I can't set the time limit for videos, or even set Videos as the only option for submission. I can write in the description "please only submit Flip videos" in the description, but I can't choose a format for submission. Also, is there any way to make the assignment page look more fun (as honestly, even many university students need some sense of fun to stay engaged) or is the ultra-boring Teams interface the only option? (I know MS has never cared about "style" or "form" the way Apple has, but surely even their UI should be better, clearer, more intuitive and more customizable than this.) Anyone with more experience with using MS Teams in the classroom, am I missing something?

Thanks for any feedback or support!

Best,

Aaron

Flip is not an option for me, and when I search for it, it does not show up as an option. The only way I see it is as a way for students to submit an assignment, but I'm not sure how I can easily open that up to the rest of the class for peer feedback in the same way Flip used to work.