A Quasi-experimental Study of University English Learners’ Engagement in a Flipped Classroom

Abstract

The demand for improving the quality of undergraduate education in China has prompted the nation-wide implementation of blended teaching approach, including flipped classroom. However, there is a lack of studies examining the effect of flipped language classroom on students’ behavioral, emotional, cognitive, and social engagement. To address this issue, this study examined the effect of a flipped English classroom on student engagement by adopting a pretest-posttest quasi-experimental design with mixed methods in a Chinese university. Data from 492 participants were collected and the results of the exploratory factor analysis (EFA) indicated that the instrument for measuring English learners’ engagement was sufficiently reliable. The results of the analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) showed that students in the experimental group (n = 268) reported significantly higher behavioral, emotional, cognitive, and social engagement than students in the control group. Students’ perceptions of their before-class and in-class learning experiences and their attitudes towards the flipped approach revealed some evidence for how and why flipped classroom could benefit language learners’ engagement. The findings shed some light on future course design and the implementation of blended learning approach.