Evaluating the Flipped Classroom in

an Undergraduate History Course

Yiran Zhao and Andrew Hopresented by Tiffany Wong

Harvard Graduate School of Education

What is a flipped classroom?

Flipped learning, or the flipped classroom, refers to pedagogical practices that allow students to learn course contents traditionally delivered in classroom lectures prior to class, with the help of technology including but not limited to online videos. Students spend class time engaging in active learning activities and may also receive individually targeted feedback from instructors (Hamdan, McKnight, McKnight, & Afstrom, 2013).

Motivation

• We wanted to better understand the impact of flipped classrooms on student learning in the humanities.

• Does it make students more motivated/do they like it more?

• More importantly, does it impact learning?

Quasi-experimental Design

• Holding the midterm exam fixed from the last (traditional, non-flipped) administration, controlling for differences in rater stringency, controlling for differences in GPA and SAT scores.

• We administered a survey to the 37 enrolled students in the fall of 2013 for the purpose of understanding their opinions about the flipped classroom model.

Results

Across a range of specifications, our models suggest that there is no statistically significant difference in the midterm exam scores. 

Survey results:a larger percent of students preferred the flipped classroom (46%) than preferred the traditional classroom (38%) (16% had no preference).

Recommendations

• This design should be implemented broadly to track the impact of flipped classroom (and any other) implementation over time.

• Flipped classrooms and blended learning are still in their nascent stages, more thought needs to go into the implementation.

• Student expectations should be made explicit to them.

• go to:http://harvardx.harvard.edu/files/harvardx/files/evaluating_the_flipped_classroom_-_zhao_and_ho.pdf• Jenny Bergeron’s report on blended learning: http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2014/07/a-virtual-analysis/

2 Ithaka reports on flipped classrooms: • http://www.sr.ithaka.org/research-publications/Interactive-Online-Learning-on-Campus• http://www.sr.ithaka.org/sites/default/files/reports/sr-ithaka-interactive-learning-online-at-public-universities.pdf

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