Using Contingency Tables and Infographics to Measure and Visualise the Impact of a Flipped Classroom on Students’ Skills

Abstract

Uso de las tablas de contingencias y de las infográficas para medir y visualizar el impacto de una clase invertida en las habilidades de los estudiantes

Introducción The Flipped Classroom (FC) has become quite common in a wide range of disciplines, such as engineering and social sciences. The majority of publications have focused on measuring its impact on students’ hard skills, such as their academic achievement. Other publications have focused on measuring students’ satisfaction. Finally, few other publications have measured its impact on students’ soft skills, such as critical thinking.

Objetivos A systematic study that measures whether there is a relationship between the hard and soft skills of students exposed to the FC making use of contingency tables.

Método We conducted a quasi-experiment, in which a group of students was divided into two subgroups. In one group, we taught a Political Science Class of Latin-American studies through the FC, while in the other group we taught the same class through a traditional teaching format. After collecting data about students’ hard and soft skills, we used contingency tables to measure whether there is any correlation between these two sets of variables. Moreover, since the results of contingency tables are usually not reader-friendly, we presented our results by using infographics, a method of data visualization that is able to show the information related to different subsamples simultaneously.

Resultados The results produced by the contingency tables suggested the type of relationship between the two sets of variables (soft and hard skills) in both groups (experimental and control). It is possible to see how different variables behave in each set. Their contribution to the relationships, their directionality and their intensity are also reported. The infographics facilitate the visualization of how each group responds to the different pedagogical stimuli received. More details will appear in the manuscript.

Discusión/Conclusión This type of experiment contributes to the process of designing evidence-based pedagogical strategies that involve the use of flipped teaching.