Master’s Thesis
Merits of the Flipped Classroom
Distance-students’ perception of usefulness and challenges regarding the flipped classroom concept in higher education
Author: Kevin Fuchs Supervisor: Nam Aghaee
Examiner: Associate Professor Päivi Jokela Date: 27th May 2020
Course Code: 4IK50E, 15 credits Subject: Information Systems Level: Graduate
Abstract
The educational sector was transforming, wherein distance learning was considered a contemporary alternative to the campus-based learning approach. The flipped classroom concept was a well-researched method that could be applied within the distance-learning paradigm. There were claims that suggest a variety of advantages, however, available publications were lacking the perspective of the primary beneficiary: the students. On this basis, the research question was formulated how distance-students in higher education perceive the benefits and challenges with the technology-enhanced flipped classroom concept.
The research was purposefully designed to build on existing contemporary knowledge claims.
The review originated from a holistic review of the flipped classroom concept down to well- established educational theories that were connected to contemporary learning methods within the field of Informatics. The empirical data for this qualitative research was collected through seven semi-structured interviews that were preceded by a preliminary observational study.
By the means of a thematic analysis, three major themes were identified that offered a broader insight into the students' perspective with regards to the benefits and challenges of the flipped classroom concept. Namely, these themes were (1) sentimental involvement, (2) flipped classroom design, and (3) participants’ perception. The findings revealed that the discussion- based sessions assisted them to foster the knowledge transfer. Furthermore, the ability to contribute and influence the discussion had been perceived as positive.
The results of this research confirmed earlier claims concerning a positive perception of the flipped classroom concept. Current scientific publications already argued the importance of student-centered education as a method to develop competencies of students and improve the knowledge transfer of the course participants. This research discovered that the flipped classroom concept was a viable tool to further empower students and facilitate constructivism through communication and enhancement of cognitivism.
Keywords: Flipped Classroom, Educational Technology, Distance Learning, Connectivism
I
Foreword & Acknowledgements
Foreword
For the most part, I have worked on this research project during the novel Coronavirus pandemic that started to affect the region where I resided in early February 2020. The surging numbers of cases accelerated countermeasures that resulted in isolation and lockdown of the region, which ultimately led to social distancing. My worries to maintain my drive and motivation to achieve outstanding research were quickly replaced by thankfulness to conduct this research project, as it allowed me to keep my sanity during this truly exceptional time. I am very thankful for all the encouraging discussions that I had with the various stakeholders.
"You miss 100% of the shots you don't take - Wayne Gretzky"
- Michael Scott
Acknowledgements
Particularly, I would like to extend my deepest appreciation to my thesis supervisor, Nam Aghaee. You have been an inspiration, motivator, and teacher throughout the entire process and I am thankful for the time and hard work you dedicated to me. Additionally, I would like to thank Professor Anita Mirijamdotter and Associate Professor Päivi Jokela for their constructive feedback during the seminars. Your experience, suggestions, and guidance allowed me to improve my research and become a more versatile researcher myself. Last but not least, I would like to thank the participants of my study for their time and valuable contribution. I completely understand how busy you were and that you had plenty of other tasks to work on, therefore I am very grateful that you made the time to attend to my research project and shared your valuable insights - even though I can not mention you personally for confidentiality reasons, but I am thankful for your help and contribution to this research study.
II
List of Tables, Figures and Abbreviations
Tables
Page
Table 1. Criteria that was used for the inclusion and exclusion of literature... 7
Table 2. Features associated with instructivism educational theory... 8
Table 3. Features associated with constructivism educational theory... 9
Table 4. Comparison of Instructivism vs. Constructivism characteristics... 10
Table 5. Amount of publications per year connected to flipped classrooms... 15
Table 6. Characteristics of qualitative- and quantitative research approach... 20
Table 7. Demographics of the interview participants... 27
Table 8. Sentiment between FC and traditional classroom by the participants... 29
Table 9. Summary of the relationship between themes, subthemes and coded findings... 37
Table 10. Summary of empirical findings referenced with relevant publications... 38
Figures
Page Figure 1. Suggested structure for a research... 4Figure 2. Thesis organization and interconnection of all chapters... 5
Figure 3. Individual steps when reviewing scientific literature... 6
Figure 4. The hierarchical construct of constructivism educational theories... 12
Figure 5. Theoretical design approach for a flipped classroom... 16
Figure 6. Hierarchical view of applied top-down approach for literature review... 17
Figure 7. Relationship between Ontology, Epistemology and the Paradigms... 18
Figure 8. Six individual phases of thematic analysis... 24
Figure 9. Interviewees’ participation level during the discussion of the FC... 28
Figure 10. Hierarchical perspective how findings were categorized... 36
Figure 11. Visualization of communication patterns in the flipped classroom... 40
Figure 12. Usage of ICT in the flipped classroom... 42
Figure 13. Simplified conceptual model of the FC... 43
Abbreviations
Abbreviations Definitions
ICT Information and Communication Technology LMS Learning Management System
FC Flipped Classroom IS Information Systems
III
Table of Contents
Abstract... I Foreword & Acknowledgements... II List of Tables, Figures and Abbreviations... III
1. Introduction ... 1
1.1. Introduction and Research Setting ... 1
1.2. Purpose Statement and Research Question ... 2
1.3. Topic Justification ... 3
1.4. Scope and Limitations ... 4
1.5. Thesis Organization ... 4
2. Review of the Literature ... 6
2.1. Review Process and Inclusion Criteria ... 6
2.2. Educational Theories: Instructivism vs. Constructivism ... 7
2.3. Cognitive Constructivism and Social Constructivism ... 11
2.4. Constructivism: Distance Learning and Connectivism ... 13
2.5. The Flipped Classroom ... 14
2.6. Summary of the Review ... 17
3. Research Design ... 18
3.1. Methodological Tradition ... 18
3.2. Methodological Approach ... 19
3.3. Method for Data Collection ... 22
3.4. Method for Data Analysis ... 23
3.5. Reliability and Validity ... 25
3.6. Ethical Considerations ... 26
4. Empirical Findings and Analysis ... 27
4.1. Demographic Profile ... 27
4.2. Sentiment Discoveries ... 28
4.3. Descriptive design of the Flipped Classroom ... 30
4.4. Participants perception of the Flipped Classroom ... 31
4.5. In-class discussion as an accelerator for knowledge transfer ... 35
5. Discussion ... 38
5.1. Introduction to the discussion ... 38
5.2. Sentimental Involvement ... 39
5.3. Flipped Classroom Design ... 39
5.4. Communication ... 40
5.5. Technology ... 41
5.6. Learning Experience ... 42
5.7. Students’ positive perception with initial barriers ... 43
6. Conclusion ... 44
6.1. Conclusions and Contributions ... 44
6.2. Recommendations for Future Research ... 45
References ... 46
Appendices ... 49
Appendix 1. An example how the literature was analyzed in the review process ... 49
Appendix 2. Interview questionnaire and Informed Consent for the participants ... 50
1. Introduction
This chapter thoroughly introduces the background and setting of the chosen research, elaborate on the purpose statement and research question, justification for the chosen research topic, present the scope and limitations as well as outline the remaining structure of the thesis.
1.1. Introduction and Research Setting
Higher education institutions continuously face the challenging task to balance between providing educational excellence in their degree programs and courses respectively, while at the same time handling an increased volume of students in their classrooms (Olaniyi, 2020).
Olaniyi (2020) further argued that the imbalanced distribution between lecturers and students resulted in unsatisfactory personal learning outcomes and unengaged students and lecturers, which was supported by an earlier claim from Kim, Kim, Khera and Getman (2014). In addition to an increased amount of students in a classroom, the educational sector was transforming, wherein traditional lecturing was considered outdated and transformational methods in the discipline of distance learning became the new norm in higher education (Bond, Buntins, Bedenlier, Zawacki-Richter and Kerres, 2020). The claim was further supported by O'Flaherty and Phillips (2015) who stated that there was increased pressure for higher educational institutions to transform in order to cope with the increased amount of students while providing a makeover on the methods how content is taught and delivered to meet current conceptual demands (Thai, De Wever and Valcke, 2017).
A potential way to handle the aggregated influx of students as well as deliver a contemporary method to lecture students was the flipped classroom concept (Melzer, 2019). The concept innovated the conventional classroom experience, wherein traditionally a lecturer delivers the content to the students who take notes during class and the lecture is adjourned with the task to apply the newly gained knowledge through their homework. This simplified description of a traditional teaching method is claimed outdated (Bond et al., 2020) and disengaging towards students and teachers alike (Melzer, 2019). Nowadays the flipped classroom concept can be applied in order to transform and innovate at which point the student is tasked to watch an online tutorial ahead of the physical in-class lecture in order to gain a fundamental knowledge base. The student takes that acquired knowledge to the physical classroom in order to participate in an active and engaging discussion on the subject (Thai et al., 2017).
The flipped classroom concept itself is not new, however, with the advancement of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and the urgent desire to transform educational methods in higher education, it is claimed that the flipped classroom concept has several advantages that meet today’s demands and offer ways to improve the engagement level of students and affect the learning outcomes of the participants and therefore contribute towards an improved overall learning experience (Melzer, 2019; Olaniyi, 2020). Linnaeus University takes already advantage of the flipped classroom concept for some of their courses at the Faculty of Technology at their Växjö campus in the Informatics department. The objective of this thesis was to collect qualitative data from distance-students that participated in flipped classroom courses at Linnaeus University within the Department of Informatics and analyze their perception towards this teaching concept compared to traditional learning methods. The results of this study aim to close a knowledge gap in order to further improve the flipped classroom concept and learning experience for future students.
1.2. Purpose Statement and Research Question
The purpose of this paper was to examine how do distance-students perceived the flipped classroom concept as part of their educational journey as opposed to the traditional classroom teaching method. It was argued that the focus in higher education was shifting from the teacher’s knowledge towards active participation and engagement of the student to foster the development of their competencies and allowing them to excel in their respective educational path (Lundin, Rensfeldt, Hillman, Lantz-Andersson and Peterson, 2018). Transformational learning concepts such as peer-lecturing or inquiry-based learning have become the new norm in the distance-learning environment and it has been a step towards reaching the goal of student participation and engagement in higher education by shifting away from lecture-based teaching (Majchrzak, Markus and Wareham, 2016).
Furthermore, these concepts utilized a variety of different methods that supported the underlying learning objectives of the student, whereas the flipped classroom concept started to get more traction in higher education institutions based on its merits to improve the learning outcomes for students by increasing active participation and engagement (Lundin et al., 2018;
Olaniyi, 2020). The flipped classroom concept was a viable alternative for higher educational institutions like Linnaeus University to address the challenge of an increased number of students in a classroom. While simultaneously focusing on the demand to transform the methods of how education was relayed to the students; therefore this study aimed to outline the particular advantages and disadvantages of flipped classrooms at Linnaeus University. On this basis the following research question can be stated:
How do distance-students in higher education perceive benefits and challenges with the technology-enhanced flipped classroom concept as part of their educational journey as opposed to the traditional classroom teaching method?
To adequately answer the preceding research question, there was a need to discuss the educational theories that provide context and set the base framework in order to systematically move from different interpretations of these theories towards different teaching methods, which include the flipped classroom concept. Besides learning theory, learning outcome, the teachers’ role as well as students’ role, the flipped classroom concept and design was discussed and analyzed meticulously in order to build an extensive basis for the research.
The research will use the qualitative approach with the strategy of inquiry to conduct semi- structured interviews. The interviews were preceded by a non-participant observation in order to determine relevant and purposeful questions for the qualitative data collection. Answering the previously stated research question allowed to close an identified knowledge gap in the field of informatics as presently there were scientific publications available pertaining to the advantages and disadvantages of flipped classrooms in different educational institutions.
However there was a lack of relevant information on how students perceive the usefulness and challenges of this teaching method.
Furthermore, the thesis addressed the outlined challenges that higher educational institutions were currently opposed to with regards to transforming their teaching concepts concerning how education was delivered to their students. Furthermore, altering and improving the methods that aim to build and transfer the knowledge, while at the same time managing an increased amount of students in their degree programs and classrooms.
1.3. Topic Justification
It is widely recognized that the relevance of educational transformation is imminent and that flipped classrooms can offer a partial solution towards the challenging task to provide quality education while trying to cope with the increased amount of students that attend these courses (Kim et al., 2014; Olaniyi, 2020). Furthermore, Kim et al. (2014) claimed that flipped classrooms offer the benefit of higher engagement levels and the major advantage that resources can be optimized and better allocated to tackle the arising issue of larger classrooms and transforming educational needs, which is further supported by the claim of Bond et al.
(2020). However, Kim et al. (2014) also addressed that most of the existing studies have additional calls for research, which is one of the primary drivers for this research project to close an identified knowledge gap with regards to the perception of flipped classrooms.
In a separate, but relatable study regarding the effectiveness of flipped classrooms, Abeysekera and Dawson (2015) support the earlier statement that traditional learning is passive and not contemporary enough to address current educational needs. Furthermore it does not foster the development of competencies. One of the main advantages with regards to the flipped classroom is that it improves student engagement levels even in large-scale classrooms (Abeysekera et al., 2015; Olaniyi, 2020). This degree project and the subsequent research is also significant because it will provide additional viewpoints on the flipped classroom concept from active participants that are on the receiving end of this educational method. It is argued that higher educational institutions’ continue to struggle in an effort to engage a majority of students and consequently, the students fail to develop sufficiently their competencies that are critical upon graduation (McLaughlin, Roth, Glatt, Gharkholonarehe, Davidson, Griffin, Esserman and Mumper, 2014; Li, Lai and Szeto, 2019).
McLaughlin et al. (2014) claimed that namely, critical thinking, complex reasoning skills as well as written communication were at the core of most underdeveloped competences in higher educational institutions, which according to Li et al. (2019) was still a valid claim.
Given there are advantages that the flipped classroom concept can contribute in an effort to enhance student engagement and respectively improve the learning outcomes, while simultaneously managing the increased amount of students in a classroom (Bishop and Verleger, 2013; Zainuddin and Perera, 2019). In addition to the anticipated benefits by applying the flipped classroom concept, the underlying methods were examined by Davies, Dean and Ball (2013) with the objective to identify how Information and Communication Technology can contribute in a learning effort. Furthermore, Davies et al. (2013) claim that a technology-enhanced flipped classroom facilitates a better learning approach and that students acknowledged this approach as more engaging compared to a traditional learning environment, which was further supported by Majchrzak et al. (2016).
Suhre, Winnips, de Boer, Valdivia and Beldhuis (2019) claimed that flipped classroom lecturers concur that the instructional videos that precede the physical contact class are not the differentiating factor on their own, but rather how they are integrated into the overall approach and concept of the flipped classroom course. This poses the question as to what a suitable approach would be with regards to flipped classrooms. Drawing back to the justification of this study linked with the claims by Davies, Dean and Ball (2013) as well as Zainuddin and Perera (2019), it is important to collect more qualitative data and analyze how students perceive the usefulness and possible challenges of flipped classrooms in order to complement the existing knowledge about the teachers’ perspective on this topic.
1.4. Scope and Limitations
The scope and limitation of this research project are to examine the perception of distance- students in higher education with regards to the flipped classroom concept. The qualitative data for this research is collected from active distance-students that are enrolled at Linnaeus University. These students were enrolled at the Växjö campus, in a second-cycle degree program at the Faculty of Technology within the Department of Informatics. The academic year corresponding to the data collection was 2019/2020 and the scope of this study is limited to these parameters and the collected data is representative for the aforementioned group of participants. Further limitations might be added in the subsequent chapters based on the analysis of the collected data.
1.5. Thesis Organization
This subchapter will elaborate on how the remainder of the degree project is organized and structured. The following structure was adapted based on the recommendations and claims made by Creswell and Creswell (2017) as seen in Figure 1 below.
Figure 1. Suggested structure for a research (adapted from Creswell and Creswell, 2017) Generally, the research is divided into six separate chapters, wherein the current chapter aims to provide context to the reader with regards to the background, research objective, topic justification, scope and limitations of the study. The following chapter will extensively address the review of the literature, whereas initially the review process will be introduced and the inclusion criteria were justified. Thereafter, the literature review is built top-down to firstly elaborate high-level educational theories, its subsequent layers before extensively discussing the flipped classroom concept, design and associated advantages and disadvantages of flipped classrooms. The chapter will be concluded with a brief summary of the respective subchapters to highlight key information.
The third chapter of this report will introduce the research design, which aims to cover methodological traditions, -approach as well as methods for data collection and analysis.
Beyond the introduction, the author will also provide justification why the chosen methods are deemed relevant for this research project. The fourth and fifth chapters will include an extensive discussion of the collected data through thematic analysis; its findings and the corresponding results will be presented in a systematic order. Before the degree project is concluded with the final chapter, which includes the conclusion of the project, how the research contributed with regards to advancing knowledge as well as any future calls for
Research Project
Chapter I Chapter II Chapter III Chapter
IV + V Chapter VI
Conclusion Findings &
Discussion Methodological
Design Literature
Review Introduction
research that are the result of this study. Lastly, any cited publications that were marked as an in-text reference in this paper is mentioned in the bibliography, which is sorted in alphabetical order and subsequent to the sixth chapter of this paper. Based on the introduction of the individual chapters, the interconnectivity of each chapter will be presented as visualized in Figure 2 below.
Chapter 1
Introduction
Chapter 2 Chapter 2
Review of the Literature Theoretical Framework
Chapter 3
Research Design
Chapter 5 Chapter 4
Discussions Empirical Findings
Chapter 6
Conclusion
Figure 2. Thesis organization and interconnection of all chapters (based on thesis structure) The first chapter that includes the introduction lays the groundwork for the degree project.
The introduction leads directly to the review of the literature and theoretical framework, which are both covered in the second chapter. Additionally, the introduction has a direct link to the sixth and final chapter. The final chapter will draw back the link to the established research space in the introduction and aims to answer the initial research question.
Furthermore, the second chapter leads to the research design, which is covered in the third chapter of this study. The third research design leads to the empirical findings covered in the fourth chapter, which translates to the discussion through the means of thematic analysis. The discussion links back to the review of the literature as it seeks to connect the analyzed findings with the relevant literature before moving towards the last chapter that contains the conclusion of the research project.
2. Review of the Literature
This chapter will discuss different educational theories and the argued perspectives, which ultimately lead to the flipped classroom concept and then link back to the educational theory.
Furthermore, the chapter will discuss critically the current practice in order to establish a reliable and versatile research space. The chapter is concluded with a summary that outlines the key facts with regards to the entire discussion leading from main education theories down to the flipped classroom concept.
2.1. Review Process and Inclusion Criteria
This subchapter will chronologically explain the authors’ review process of the literature and what criteria were used for the inclusion and exclusion as well as the elaborate the process in order to demonstrate that the established theoretical framework for this degree project is reliable while providing a versatile insight into existing knowledge claims with regards to flipped classrooms.
As part of the review process, the author decisively chose to follow the suggested review process by Podsakoff, MacKenzie, Lee and Podsakoff (2003) that entails four individual steps in order to conduct a review of respective literature for the inclusion in a research paper. The individual steps as seen in Figure 3 below can be referred to as identification, screening, eligibility and finally inclusion. Wee and Banister (2016) as well as Hart (2018) support the original claim and further argue that it is still a contemporary review method for literature.
Figure 3. Individual steps when reviewing scientific literature (adapted from Podakoff et al., 2003; Wee et al. 2016; Hart, 2018)
The author chose to work with the scientific database Scopus, which contains a large variety of peer-reviewed publications in the field of Informatics and he decisively chose to delimit the academic sources to three types of publications in order to build a reliable pool of information. In order to be deemed eligible for this review of the literature and subsequent discussion, the publication needs to be a journal article, conference paper, or educational book in order to provide the best possible quality of existing research for the following review.
The first step of the review is referring to identification, which means to inquire for relevant publications in the Scopus database by using relevant search terms. The author chose to delimit the search parameters that contain “flipped classroom” and “educational theory”. The former term refers to the research topic, while the latter term is referring to educational theory in order to build a base for the subsequent literature review and discussion.
In the second step, the corresponding results in Scopus were screened, which meant to read the title of the publication and decide if it is relevant for the literature review or not.
Eligibility as the third step is referring to screening the abstract of the publications that were selected in the previous step and if deemed relevant, they were selected for the fourth and
final step: inclusion. The final step meant that a full review of the paper was conducted upon which publications were either deemed relevant and were included or deemed not relevant and were excluded. For included articles, an analysis of the used methods, discussion, and conclusion was conducted. A sample of the literature review analysis is shown in Appendix 1.
In addition to the four steps, the author purposefully applied inclusion and exclusion criteria in order to limit the list of available literature to relevant publications. Therefore only articles that were published in the English language were deemed eligible and other languages were excluded by default. Additionally, for the search term “flipped classroom”, only publications in the last eight years were considered relevant and older publications were excluded by default. For the educational theories, older publications were used when the original theory is still deemed accurate. If the original theory has evolved or was altered through reliable claims, the subsequent newer claim was added in support of the original claim for the theory.
Table 1. Criteria that was used for the inclusion and exclusion of literature (based on Meline, 2006 and Hart, 2018)
Inclusion Exclusion
Scopus database -
Search terms "flipped classroom" or
"educational theory" in article title, abstract or keyword
-
Publications with the term "flipped classroom" 2010 or newer
Publication with the term "flipped classroom"
2009 or older Publications with the term "educational
theory" 2019 or older
-
English language Other languages than English
Journal, conference paper or book Other types of publications
Based on the application of the four steps by Podsakoff, et al. (2003; Wee et al., 2016; Hart, 2018) in conjunction with the inclusion and exclusion criteria that is shown in Table 1 above, the initial search inquiry was limited from 5,851 publications to 43 publications that were ultimately analyzed and included in this literature review.
2.2. Educational Theories: Instructivism vs. Constructivism
In order to get a better grasp of the flipped classroom concept and its role in higher education, it is important to provide a hierarchical top-down definition of how flipped classrooms fit into the existing educational theory. Therefore, this subchapter will extensively discuss established educational theories and how the flipped classroom concept fits into the scheme of these educational theories respectively.
In the field of education, instructivism and constructivism are two highly regarded and often cited theories that describe two different philosophies on how knowledge is supposed to be relayed to students. The underlying concepts behind the respective theories are fundamentally different, wherein instructivism is rather teacher-focused and constructivism is mainly student-centered (Bain, 2003). It is claimed that instructivism and constructivism can be further sub-classified into behaviorism and cognitivism for the instructivism theory and constructivism and connectivism for the constructivism theory as also visualized in Table 2.
As stated, the theories associated with instructivism rely on a teacher-focused form of education and accordingly the student becomes the passive recipient of the teachers’
instructions (Steffe and Gale, 1995). Similarly, the role of the teacher is interpreted correspondingly, whereas the lecturer leads the content and narrative of each class actively (Bain, 2003; Piskunova, Starostova and Yankov, 2018).
Moreover, the learning outcomes for both theories have similar aims that strive to transfer the structure of the world onto the learner for both behaviorism as well as cognitivism within the instructivism paradigm (Piskunova et al., 2018). While the learning outcomes are intended to be effective and efficient for knowledge transfer in both theoretical models the learning theory differs between the two models. Behaviorism claims that the link between stimuli and response lead to new knowledge or changed knowledge for the affected person (Steffe and Gale, 1995), while it is argued for the cognitivism theory that processing of received information and linking it back to already existing knowledge of the individual (Piskunova et al., 2018) as also summarized in Table 2.
Table 2. Features associated with instructivism educational theory (cited from Steffe and Gale, 1995; Bain, 2003; Piskunova et al., 2018)
Educational
Theory Sub-
classification Learning
Theory Learning
Outcomes Teacher’s
role Student’s role Instructivism Behaviorism Link between
stimuli and response lead to new knowledge or changed knowledge
Mapping the structure of the world onto the learner;
effective and efficient knowledge transfer
Center of instruction with full control of the narrative and process
Passive recipient of teachers’
instructions
Cognitivism Processing of received information and linking to already existing knowledge
Mapping the structure of the world onto the learner;
effective and efficient knowledge transfer
Center of instruction with full control of the narrative and process
Passive recipient of teachers’
instructions
The characteristics of both theories can be further elaborated by respective teaching methods that are deemed applicable. Both theories are largely lecture-based and centered around the lecturer, whereas teaching methods in for the behaviorism theory would include rote learning that largely relies on repetition to memorize the knowledge, multiple-choice tests, or drill and practice which mostly relates to content learning. For the cognitivism theory, the teaching methods are not limited to but include visual tools such as mind maps or charts to foster memorization as well as multiple-choice tests and essay assessment (Piskunova et al., 2018).
In essence, it can be stated that the main difference between cognitivism and behaviorism theories lies in the learning theory (Steffe and Gale, 1995) and applied teaching methods
(Porcaro, 2011), whereas the learning outcome, role of the teacher as well as role of the student can be assumed identical as argued by Bain (2003).
Opposed to instructivism, which is mainly teacher-focused with regards to how information and knowledge are relayed and passed along, constructivism emphasizes on active contribution from the student. Looking closer at the theory of constructivism, it shall be noted that there are claims how constructivism theory should be interpreted. The most known and influential claims were made by Piaget (1976) who describes the constructivism theory as cognitive constructivism, wherein on the other hand Dewey (1933; Dewey et al. 1999) and Vygotsky (1978) interpret it as social constructivism. These are the two fundamental pillars that define constructivism theory in education and have been widely accepted and used in the last decades. Nevertheless, there are sub-theories that emerged over the years, which will be further introduced in subchapter 2.3.
The main differences of characteristics between cognitive constructivism as claimed by Piaget (1976) and socio-cultural constructivism as claimed by Dewey (1993) and Vygotsky (1978) are with the learning theory and also learning outcomes as also visualized in Table 3 below.
Table 3. Features associated with constructivism educational theory (cited from Dewey 1933;
Piaget, 1976; Vygotsky, 1978; Dewey, Wald, Quitoriano and Dengler, 1999) Educational
Theory
Sub-
classification
Learning Theory
Learning Outcomes
Teachers’
role
Students’
role Constructivism Cognitive
constructivis m
Engagement with others, construct personal meaning
Creating collaboratio ns and interpreting knowledge
Facilitates learning by providing a suitable environmen t
Active constructor of
knowledge and center of learning environment Socio-
cultural constructivis m
Constructing interrelated subjective meaning with more
knowledgeab le peers
Flexible thinking skills and the domain practices for lifelong learning
Facilitator, tutor, mentor and guide
Center of learning environment and
participant in community practice The learning theory regarding cognitive constructivism aims to seek engagement amongst peers and construct a personal meaning in order to create knowledge transfer (Piaget, 1976).
Socio-cultural constructivism on the other hand seeks to construct correlated and subjective meaning with more knowledgeable peers (Dewey, Wald, Quitoriano and Dengler, 1999). As far as the role of the lecturer and student is concerned, both sub-classifications of the constructivism theory agree that the teachers’ role is to facilitate learning by providing a suitable learning environment while interacting with students to tutor, guide and mentor the discussion in order to facilitate the knowledge transfer. In the constructivism theory, the students are the active constructor of knowledge and form the center of the respective learning environment. Lastly, the learning outcomes for both interpretations of constructivism theory
differs slightly, wherein cognitive constructivism seeks to create collaborations and interpreting knowledge, whereas socio-cultural constructivism pursues flexible thinking skills and the domain practices for lifelong learning (Dewey, Wald, Quitoriano and Dengler, 1999).
As stated at the beginning of the subchapter, one of the main differentiators between instructivism compared to constructivism is the role of the teacher and student, however, there are other distinguishable differentiators that describe each educational theory as seen in Table 4 below.
The social learning aspect through interaction, communication, and socialization with peers is a large differentiator between constructivism and instructivism, wherein the latter rather emphasizes on task-based learning, wherein it is believed that repetition will lead to hardwiring of experiences. Constructivism on the other hand emphasizes that students are supposed to share their own knowledge as a prerequisite to build new knowledge or change the students’ perception of particular information (Wald, Quitoriano and Dengler, 1999) and supported by Crosslin (2016).
Table 4. Comparison of Instructivism vs. Constructivism characteristics (cited from Wald, Quitoriano and Dengler, 1999; Badia and Iglesias, 2019)
Property Instructivism Constructivism
Behaviorism Cognitivism Cognitive constructivism &
Socio-cultural constructivism How
learning occurs
Black box:
observable behavior main focus
Structured, computational
Social, meaning is created by each learner, personal
Influencing factors
Nature of reward, punishment, stimuli
Existing schema, previous experiences
Engagement, participation, social, cultural
Role of memory
Hardwiring of repeated experiences where reward and punishment are most influential
Encoding, storage, retrieval
Prior knowledge remixed to the current context
How transfer occurs
Stimulus, response Duplicating knowledge constructs of
“knower”
Socialization
Types of learning best explained
Task-based learning Reasoning, clear objectives, problem- solving
Social, vague (“ill-defined”)
Crosslin (2016) argued that another characteristic that differentiates instructivism and constructivism is that in the constructivism theory, it is believed that the more the learner knows, the more peers can benefit and learn as well, while he claims that in the instructivism theory, the knowledge transfer is dependable on the existing knowledge of the teacher who is regarded as the primary agent of learning. Badia et al. (2019) further support the claim made by Crosslin (2016) and add that contextual learning is another differentiator for both theories, wherein constructivism theory does not teach isolated facts and information that have no relationship to the bigger picture, whereas instructivism does (Badia and Iglesias, 2019).
2.3. Cognitive Constructivism and Social Constructivism
Though both interpretations of the constructivism theory share the same basic principles, there is a fundamental difference between cognitive constructivism and social constructivism or socio-cultural constructivism. The term social constructivism and socio-cultural constructivism are used interchangeably in this paper. Furthermore, this subchapter aims to discuss the differences between both interpretations as well as other sub-interpretations that emerged in recent years. The theoretical views of the respective educational models are supported by the publication that claimed and described them initially, whereas if a more recent publication added any claim, it will be subsequently mentioned and argued in the respective definition of the theoretical models.
While main characteristics that distinguish cognitive constructivism and social constructivism were already highlighted in the previous subchapter and visualized in Table 3 and Table 4, there is still a need to provide an academic definition for both interpretations in order to provide more context in the discussion of both theories.
Cognitive Constructivism
According to the theory developed by Piaget, it is argued that knowledge is produced and formed based upon the experience of an individual. Piaget claims that the formation and adoption of knowledge depend on two main elements that are considered significant for this educational theory: accommodation and assimilation. The latter refers to the adoption of new experiences into existing experiences, while the former is referring to allowing new experiences to complement existing experiences. In other words, it can be described that assimilation alters the existing experience, whereas accommodation allows the experience to expand, wherein both lead to a new perception of knowledge.
(Piaget, 1976).
Social Constructivism
The theory of social constructivism claimed by Dewey (1933, 1999) argued that repetitive and rote memorization in education did not lead to the desired outcome;
furthermore Dewey (1999) claimed it as ineffective and inefficient to develop knowledge and acquire competencies. Dewey (1933, 1999) argues with his theory that education and knowledge transfer and advancement should be fostered through practical workshops; engage in real-world projects, in which students can demonstrate their knowledge through creativity and collaboration (Dewey, 1933). Vygotsky (1978) agreed on that notion and further argued that education should be student-centered and knowledge transfer occurs through building relationships amongst peers (Vygotsky, 1978).
Within the theory of constructivism, the cognitive constructivism claimed by Piaget (1976) as well as social constructivism (Vygotsky, 1978; Dewey et al. 1999) have been the backbone of the scientific community for many decades. Many subsequent papers and research projects are built on the well-argued interpretation of constructivism, however, as the educational needs continue to evolve and transform, there has been another layer of sub-classification in the recent years that further distinguish cognitive constructivism as well as social constructivism as seen in Figure 4 below, which visualizes the latest hierarchical construct of constructivism educational theories (Karpouza and Emvalotis, 2019; Pavlović and Maksić, 2019). While a very in-depth analysis of each sub-interpretation of the constructivism theory does not
contribute direct value to the research objective of this paper, it is important to understand the emerging theories in their respective context and therefore a brief definition for each of the sub-interpretations as visualized in Figure 4 below will be provided in order to put them into context when introducing the flipped classroom concept in subchapter 2.5.
Figure 4. The hierarchical construct of constructivism educational theories (based on the original theories and claims from Dewey, 1993; Piaget, 1976; Vygotsky, 1978)
The following three modified concepts were developed based on the original idea of cognitive constructivism and social constructivism respectively and will be further defined below.
Radical Constructivism
Radical constructivism can be described as a theory that closely relates to the claims made by Piaget in 1976, whereas Von Glaserfeld argues it as a more radical perspective.
Von Glaserfeld claims that at the center of knowledge construction is the individual and the individuals’ interactions and interpretations, which can be further influenced by externalities. The theory of knowledge relevant to radical constructivism is based on two main principles. Firstly that knowledge is not passively received, but gradually built over time and secondly that the perception and reasoning of the learner serve better for the organization of the experiential world and not for the discovery of ontological realism. (Von Glaserfeld, 1984, 2003).
Critical Constructivism
Fleury, Garrison and Désautels (1998) define critical constructivism as the extension of social constructivism as originally defined by Dewey (1933, 1999) and Vygotsky (1978), whereas Fleury et al. (1998, 2007) argue that knowledge is not a tangible substance that can be deposited like money in a bank and withdraw at any time. It is further claimed that knowledge is constructed in the minds of the individual and formed by the society that surrounds the individual (Fleury et al., 1998; Fleury et al., 2007).
Cultural Constructivism
Hutchison (2006) agrees with the initial description and claims made by Dewey (1933, 1999) and Vygotsky (1978) with regards to social constructivism, however, Hutchinson (2006) adds that social constructivism is cultural-centered and should be interpreted in
Constructivism Theory
Cognitive Constructivism
(Piaget) Radical
Constructivism (von Glaserfeld)
Social Constructivism (Dewey, Vygotsky)
Cultural Constructivism
(Hutchinson) Critical
Constructivism (Fleury)
the context of the relevant culture. Hutchinson (2006) claims that knowledge can be interpreted and developed differently based on the cultural values of a society. It is further claimed that there is not only one knowledge that is correct and applicable for a specific topic or field, but rather a diversity of different knowledge perspectives that may answer the same question depending on the cultural context (Hutchison, 2006).
2.4. Constructivism: Distance Learning and Connectivism
Distance learning can be described as an educational approach within the constructivism theory, wherein traditional face-to-face classroom teaching is replaced with classes that are carried out entirely online (Graham, 2006). The distance learning approach strongly depends on the support of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT). Even though the distance learning approach is not a new method to the educational sector, however, there is still a lot of ambiguity with regards to its place in higher education as claimed by Havemann, Charles, Sherman, Rodgers and Barros (2019). It was stated that distance learning is the result of a replaced physical classroom teaching approach with an online classroom that can be accessed remotely from any location. Distance learning is strongly supported by Information and Communication Technologies (Graham, 2006). In most cases, the virtual classroom is facilitated by a Learning Management System (LMS) which can be described as a learning platform that provides a forum for students and teachers to interact, communicate and initiate the knowledge transfer virtually (Dziuban, Graham, Moskal, Norberg and Sicilia, 2018).
Dziuban et al. (2018) further argue that without the rapid development of ICT since the late 1990s and early 2000’s there would not be the same distance learning concepts that can be seen nowadays as it strongly depends on the use of ICT. Drawing back to the LMS as a platform to facilitate the virtual classroom, oftentimes the lecturer provides tutorials on a particular subject, creates specific tasks that the students need to accomplish, or facilitates an online discussion on a certain topic. The difference to traditional classroom teaching is that the student is further empowered and able to chose the place from where the learning management system is accessed as opposed to a physical classroom within the educational facility. It offers a higher degree of flexibility to accommodate personal needs (Dziuban et al., 2018; Havemann et al., 2019; Hrastinski, 2019).
Graham (2006) and Hrastinski (2019) both claim that distance learning is another step towards student empowerment, which further evolves the original theory from Piaget (1976) and Vygotsky (1978). While constructivism compared with instructivism shifts the focus towards student-centered education as opposed to teacher-focused education, distance learning arguably grants the student more freedom to choose the location and the environment to study in (Hrastinski, 2019; Havemann et al., 2019). Garrison and Kanuka (2004) claimed already more than 15 years ago that distance learning has the demonstrated potential to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of meaningful learning experiences, which is supported by many recent academic publications (Dziuban et al., 2018; Havemann et al., 2019; Hrastinski, 2019).
However, in order to consider advantages of the distance learning approach, it should be stated that the advantage of distance learning depends on the perspective as there are three actors involved in distance learning: the student, the teacher and the educational institution (Garrison et al., 2004). Based on recent research that aimed to examine the perceived advantages of distance learning for students, it can be stated that students mostly valued the
flexibility, accommodation of different learning styles within the same course as well as helped them to reach their desired learning outcomes more efficiently (Saltan, 2017; Jin and Shang, 2019). On the other hand, teachers valued most that distance learning saved them lecturing time, which can be reallocated towards tutoring of students (Saltan, 2017; Herbert, Velan, Pryor and Kumar, 2017), while educational facilities can save money due to the fact that a smaller share of physical classroom space is used up (Herbert et al., 2017).
While constructivism educational theory encompasses distance-education in higher education nowadays (Jin et al, 2019), connectivism is an integral learning theory that relates to the usage of Information and Communication Technologies in distance-education (Goldie, 2016).
Goldie (2016) describes connectivism as a conceptual framework that interprets learning as a phenomenon influenced by technology and socialization. Similarly to Hutchinson (2006) who claimed that knowledge transfer and learning is depending on the cultural context. However, Goldie (2016) further claims that technology is an essential part that defines connectivism.
Although connectivim is not a standalone educational theory similar to the instructivism or constructivism, neither it can be seen as a sub-classification within an existing educational theory such as cognitive constructivism as claimed by Piaget (1976) or socio-cultural constructivism as claimed by Dewey (1993) and Vygotsky (1978).
However, connectivism is best interpreted as a supplementary learning theory that largely considers the technological aspect of learning theories (Goldie, 2016) and therefore has relevance and connection to this research project. Based on the publication by Goldie (2016) the conclusions with regards to connectivism learning theory were that there is not a single educational theory that explained connectivism. Connectivism is comprehensively reliant on the usage of Information and Communication Technologies that build the basis for this learning theory upon which knowledge is shared with the support of digital technologies, such as Learning Management Systems, communication tools for video conferences or messaging, or tools that enable to content creation and sharing. Through the means of these Information and Communication Technologies, connectivism helps in the process to form connections between the students with technology in order to engage in a knowledge transfer that was described by the respective educational theories (Goldie, 2016). In the following subchapter, the flipped classroom concept is introduced in detail before tying the educational theories, distance-learning, and flipped classroom concept together.
2.5. The Flipped Classroom
The preceding subchapters built systematically on the educational theories related to flipped classrooms, whereas this subchapter will provide a more elaborative definition of the flipped classroom concept and design of a flipped classroom. It is the objective of the research to examine the perspective of distance-students; therefore the flipped classroom concept is elaborated on that basis. In order to fully grasp the concept, it is important to establish a general definition of flipped classrooms. Abeysekera et al. (2015) argue that the largest differences between a traditional classroom and flipped classroom are that the students receive information online that can be accessed remotely in order to familiarize themselves with the topic at hand and then take the acquired knowledge into the virtual classroom in order to have a more sophisticated discussion with the lecturer and peers on the specific subject (Abeysekera et al., 2015). In a traditional learning experience, the course instructor would hold a lecture in the form of one-way communication where information is passed to the students in order to increase their knowledge of a particular subject.
In a flipped classroom, the students have the opportunity to study the material remotely at their own pace and reflect on the content before discussing the topic critically in the virtual classroom (Baepler, Walker and Driessen, 2014). Comparing both approaches from a process and operational point of view, the traditional classroom method can be described with the following steps wherein the teacher instructs, students are encouraged to take notes accordingly, students follow guided instructions by the teacher, the teacher gives an assessment and students have homework to foster knowledge through repetition.
Melzer (2019) describes that in the flipped classroom method, the following process steps that start with the teacher providing online guidance through an e-learning platform, students can access the e-learning platform at their convenience, students will study the material independently from a remote location. Next, students will attend a virtual classroom with prior knowledge and finally, the teacher and students discuss the particular topic, wherein each student has already acquired fundamental knowledge about the subject (Melzer, 2019).
Table 5 below shows an increased amount of academic publications in the last six to eight years that mainly focus on the opportunities and challenges that flipped classrooms bear compared to a traditional classroom.
Table 5. Amount of publications per year connected to flipped classrooms (Scopus, 2020)
Year: 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019
Publications: 0 0 13 72 183 402 447 504 623 639
The number of publications in the recent years revealed two primary findings: (1) the flipped classroom concept did not receive much attention prior to 2010 as the number of publications directly related to flipped classrooms did not yield any results in Scopus academic database and (2) that the amount of publications in the last three years exceeds the number of total publications. This suggests that the topic is considered as very relevant with regards to contemporary teaching methods and also offers a very recent and varied calls for further research that has not been answered yet, henceforth advancing the knowledge with regards to the flipped classroom concept can be seen as an advantage to fully understand this particular phenomenon.
Supplementary to the definition of the flipped classroom, the theoretical flow chart in Figure 5 below is an example of how an effective and efficient flipped classroom process can be designed and applied (Mukherjee & Bleakney, 2017; Valdehita, Plata and Merodio, 2017).
The pre-class stage is completed online from a remote location, wherein the student receives particular tasks on the given topic in order to acquire more knowledge (Mukherjee et al., 2017). The second stage of the flipped classroom model consists of a discussion in a virtual classroom. This part largely relates to the knowledge transfer amongst peers as claimed by Piaget (1976). The teacher acts here as a facilitator and guides the discussion, wherein the discussion itself is student-centered and amongst peers who had time to reflect on the information received in the first stage of the model. Mukherjee et al. (2017) further state that the third stage is described as post-class, which consists of more practice and formative as well as a summative assessment, which is also carried out online through the LMS.
Hence it can be said that one isolated flipped classroom session follows three repetitive steps that are delivered to the students (Mukherjee et al., 2017). As noted, the design of a flipped classroom is supported by an LMS, which forms the primary ICT that is used for flipped classrooms. The platform facilitates the communication between student and teacher as well as peer discussions, tutorial instructions for stage one, the virtual classroom for stage two as well as practice and assessment opportunities for stage three, which is post-class.
Figure 5. Theoretical design approach for a flipped classroom (adapted from Mukherjee &
Bleakney, 2017)
There has been considerable academic research about flipped classrooms in higher education that provide a holistic view of its application within the existing educational theory as well as advantages that the flipped classroom concepts offers (Bishop and Verleger, 2013;
McLaughlin, Roth, Glatt, Gharkholonarehe, Davidson, Griffin, Esserman and Mumper, 2014;
O'Flaherty and Phillips, 2015; Melzer, 2019) however there is a lack of academic research that examines the perception of the primary user of flipped classrooms: the students (Davies, Mitchell, Petter and Harris, 2017). This research aims to close the identified knowledge gap and aims to analyze how distance-students perceive benefits and challenges with the flipped classroom concept as part of their educational journey as opposed to the traditional classroom teaching method. The collected data in the subsequent chapter will then be linked back to the theoretical framework and the review of existing literature from this chapter in order to facilitate a versatile and reliable discussion that will advance the knowledge in the field of informatics with regards to flipped classrooms (Fulton, 2012; Melzer, 2019).
< Stage 1 > < Stage 2 > < Stage 3 >
Individual With teacher Individual Pre-Class During-Class Post-Class
Topic Orientation Active Learning Formative Summative & Assessment Assessment Staging Activity
Practice Teacher & Peer (examples) Feedback
Feedback (assessed vs.
(online or learning in person) outcomes)
2.6. Summary of the Review
The review of the literature extensively discussed and examined the concept of flipped classrooms initiated by a top-down review of relevant educational theories as seen in Figure 6.
Constructivism Theory
Cognitive
Constructivism
Social
Constructivism
Radical
Constructivism Critical
Constructivism Cultural Constructivism
Distance Learning
(Connectivism)
Flipped Classroom Concept
Figure 6. Hierarchical view of applied top-down approach for literature review (adapted from Capone, De Caterina and Mazza, 2017; Nahar and Chowdhury, 2019; Han and Elli, 2019) At the highest level, there are educational theories with regards to constructivism vs.
instructivism, which described the different methods and characteristics of both theories. In essence, it can be stated that instructivism is teacher-focused and it is believed that repetition will lead to hardwiring of experiences, whereas constructivism is student-centered and emphasizes that knowledge transfer is initiated through socialization amongst peers. The second layer describes two different classifications of the constructivism theory. Cognitive constructivism (Piaget, 1976) and social constructivism (Dewey, 1933; Vygotsky, 1978;
Dewey et al. 1999) share the same fundamental pillar of student-centered education, however cognitive constructivism aims to seek engagement amongst peers, while social constructivism seeks to construct subjective meaning (Piaget, 1976; Vygotsky, 1978).
The third layer outlines different interpretations that relate to either cognitive constructivism or social constructivism by different researchers. These have mostly been developed and claimed within the last ten years and emphasize the fact that established educational theory is not static, but instead it evolves as the educational sector continues to seek new teaching methods in order to satisfy the demand (Havemann et al., 2019). Drawn from different interpretations of constructivism, the distance learning approach was introduced and discussed. Extensive claims have been made with regards to its application and advantages from the perspective of all three actors, i.e. student, teacher, and institution. Finally, the flipped classroom concept is analyzed based on the previously introduced educational theory.
A versatile discussion has concluded an academic definition, the design framework for flipped classrooms as well as contemporary advantages of flipped classrooms.
3. Research Design
This chapter aims to introduce the research design of this degree project and comprehensively elaborate on how the framework for the data collection has been built. The first chapter will discuss the methodological research tradition, before the subsequent subchapter will introduce the chosen methodological approach taking into account available alternatives. Furthermore the method for the data collection and data analysis will be presented and justified why the chosen method is the most suitable technique. The second last subchapter will discuss the reliability and validity of the research project, which is mostly referring to credibility, transferability, and confirmability of the results of the study. Lastly, ethical considerations that were taken into account will be mentioned and discussed.
3.1. Methodological Tradition
This subchapter will introduce the research concepts, which are formed on the basis of the respective worldviews, which can be defined as ontology and epistemology. Furthermore, the corresponding research paradigms are presented and the chosen paradigm is further justified.
In research, Ontology is referring to a set of concepts that seek to answer questions pertaining to what exists in reality. It is based on three core pillars (1) the belief that there is only one reality, (2) the belief that there are multiple realities and lastly (3) the belief that reality is constantly changing (Myer, 1997; Fletcher, 2017). Fetcher (2017) further claims that Ontology is important to determine the research paradigm, however that happens in correlation with Epistemology.
Epistemology is referring to a theory of knowledge that seeks to distinguish through investigation of justified belief instead of an opinion that has no basis for its claim (Myer, 1997). Fletcher (2017) concurs with the earlier claim and further argues that Epistemology seeks a response to what we know already, what can we know and how we acquire knowledge. Similarly to Ontology, Epistemology is also based on three core pillars that believe that (1) knowledge can be measured, (2) reality needs to be interpreted and (3) reality should be examined with the best possible tools available (Fletcher, 2017).
Ontology Epistemology
• One reality • Knowledge measurable Positivism
• Multiple realities • Reality interpretable Constructivism
• Reality is constantly changing • Examined with best tools Pragmatism
Figure 7. Relationship between Ontology, Epistemology and the Paradigms (adapted based on theory from Fletcher 2017)
Ontology can also be described as the perceived reality and Epistemology as the knowledge claim. The combination of the ontological reality with epistemological knowledge claim
