Chen Wei
School of Foreign Languages, Hainan Normal University, Haikou, China.
Front Psychol. 2024 May 16;15:1347826. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1347826. eCollection 2024.
In recent years, China has made strides in adopting student-oriented teaching approaches, particularly in tertiary English education, through the integration of enhanced technology. This study aimed to investigate the impact of flipped classroom on the English proficiency of first-year pre-service teachers at a Chinese normal university. It also sought to determine whether educational background (urban or rural) interacted with the teaching approach (flipped or traditional) in affecting the language proficiency of the learners.
A quasi-experimental design was utilized with two treatments: a flipped classroom approach and a traditional teacher-centered teaching approach. Both approaches were implemented in the Integrated English Course over a 12-week semester. Two randomly selected classes, consisting of 60 pre-service teachers in each class, were assigned to either the experimental or control group. Data were collected from pretest and post-test assessments and analyzed using two-way ANOVA.
The results revealed a positive impact of the flipped classroom and a significant interaction between educational background and teaching approach on English proficiency. Specifically, urban pre-service teachers achieved higher English proficiency than their rural peers when taught in the flipped classroom, but not in the traditional classroom. Furthermore, urban pre-service teachers in the flipped classroom outperformed their urban peers in the traditional classroom, while rural pre-service teachers did not show any significant difference in their performance between the two classes.
The findings suggested that the flipped classroom approach was more effective than the traditional approach for Chinese pre-service teachers, particularly those with an urban educational background. However, it is important to ensure that rural learners receive sufficient support to benefit equally from this innovative teaching approach. Accordingly, implications and recommendations for future research are discussed.
近年来，中国在采用以学生为导向的教学方法方面取得了长足进步，尤其是在高等英语教育中，通过整合先进技术得以实现。本研究旨在调查翻转课堂对中国一所师范大学一年级职前教师英语水平的影响。研究还试图确定教育背景（城市或农村）与教学方法（翻转或传统）在影响学习者语言水平方面是否存在交互作用。
采用准实验设计，有两种教学处理方式：翻转课堂教学法和传统的以教师为中心的教学法。两种方法都在为期12周的学期内应用于综合英语课程。随机选取两个班级，每个班级由60名职前教师组成，分别分配到实验组或对照组。数据收集自前测和后测评估，并使用双向方差分析进行分析。
结果显示翻转课堂有积极影响，且教育背景与教学方法在英语水平方面存在显著交互作用。具体而言，在翻转课堂教学时，城市职前教师的英语水平高于农村同龄人，但在传统课堂中并非如此。此外，翻转课堂中的城市职前教师表现优于传统课堂中的城市同龄人，而农村职前教师在两个班级中的表现没有显著差异。
研究结果表明，翻转课堂教学法对中国职前教师，尤其是具有城市教育背景的教师，比传统教学法更有效。然而，重要的是要确保农村学习者获得足够的支持，以便能平等地从这种创新教学方法中受益。因此，讨论了对未来研究的启示和建议。
