ConfChem Conference on Flipped Classroom: Student Engagement with Flipped Chemistry Lectures

This project introduces the idea of "flipped lecturing" to a group of second-year undergraduate students. The aim of flipped lecturing is to provide much of the "content delivery" of the lecture in advance, so that the lecture hour can be devoted to more in-depth discussion, problem solving, and so on. As well as development of the material, a formal evaluation was conducted. Fifty-one students from a year 2 chemical thermodynamics module took part in this study. Students were provided with online lectures in advance of their lectures. Along with each online lecture, students were given a handout to work through as they watch the video. Each week, a quiz was completed before each lecture, which allowed students to check their understanding and provided a grade for their continuous assessment mark. The evaluation examines both the students' usage of materials and their engagement in lectures. This involves analysis of access statistics, along with an in-class cognitive engagement instrument. The latter is measured by "interrupting" students as they work through a problem and asking four short questions, which aim to examine how students were engaging with the materials in that moment. Results from this, along with access data, quiz scores, and student comments, aim to build up a profile of how the flipped lecture works for middle stage undergraduate students. This communication summarizes one of the invited papers to the ConfChem online conference Flipped Classroom, held from May 9 to June 12, 2014 and hosted by the ACS DivCHED Committee on Computers in Chemical Education (CCCE).