IMPLEMENTATION AND ASSESSMENT OF A FLIPPED CLASSROOM MODEL IN AN INTRODUCTORY GEOLOGY CLASS (Invited Presentation)

Active learning pedagogies are valued for their success in increasing student engagement, developing transferable skills like critical thinking or quantitative reasoning, and creating deeper and more lasting educational gains. Instructors that employ active learning approaches face the problem of delivering essential disciplinary content even when a large portion of class time is devoted to hands-on activities. One model for confronting this challenge is the “flipped” or “inverted” classroom, in which course content traditionally delivered through lectures is provided through video watched by students outside of class. This presentation describes my recent efforts to incorporate a flipped classroom model in my introductory geology course. The seven hours of weekly class time are devoted to a combination of field work, in-class activities, and an hour-long question-and-answer period for students to seek clarifications on topics from the video lectures and readings. In addition to providing examples of field-based and active learning exercises, I also assess the effectiveness of this model by comparison with data from previous versions of the course taught using a traditional lecture-based format. Student performance on quizzes and examinations indicate that the learning of content in the flipped classroom environment is as effective as the traditional approach, and course evaluation data suggests that the flipped classroom model led to higher levels of student engagement, satisfaction, and more substantial learning gains. Although time-consuming for an instructor to implement, the flipped approach improves student outcomes and represents a valuable method to incorporate active learning methodologies while still maintaining broad content coverage.