The Mechanism of Flipped Classroom Based on Cognitive Schemas

Introduction

With the continuous demand for student-centered learning environment, flipped classroom has attracted a large number of researchers from domestic and foreign countries. As a new teaching mode, flipped classroom is gradually applied in teaching practice (Li & Ren, 2017; Yu, 2019), assisted with social media such as WeChat (Yu, 2020). In recent years, the flipped classroom teaching mode has attracted attention in American universities and has been widely used (Qian & Chen, 2015). As an emerging teaching method, flipped classroom has essential differences with traditional classroom. The essence of flipped classroom lies in returning to the logical starting point of teaching activities - students' learning (Wang, 2016; Chen, 2019). Flipped classroom reflects the localized teaching wisdom and educational thoughts of frontline schools under the guidance of student-centered concept (Wang, Luo & Jiang, 2018). In contrast, traditional classroom emphasizes the process of teacher lectures and student note-taking. Students have fewer opportunities to participate in learning discussions, and they cannot receive timely teacher guidance and explanation during the process of completing homework after class. Unlike traditional classroom, flipped classroom means moving the teaching part of the teacher's preaching outside the classroom. Students can learn course content independently before class through videos (Yu & Gao, 2021), courseware, textbooks, and other materials. In this way, class time can be used for active learning, such as cooperative learning and applied teaching case learning. In the flipped classroom, students can control their own learning progress according to their learning needs. Teachers can interact with students meaningfully, provide necessary help, guidance and evaluation when needed, play the role of learning facilitators, and are equal to students in the classroom, rather than lecturers who are looked up to by students in traditional classrooms.

In the wake of the advent of the flipped classroom model, extensive academic research has been conducted to scrutinize the underlying process of this innovative pedagogical approach. Subsequently, numerous empirical studies have been carried out in a diverse array of academic fields, attesting to the considerable efficacy of the flipped classroom model in enhancing student learning outcomes and stimulating learning enthusiasm. Recent academic inquiry still primarily revolves around classroom practice, with the majority of empirical findings endorsing the deployment of the flipped classroom model. Yet, despite its substantial positive outcomes, only a paucity of scholarly analyses have systematically articulated the cognitive schema theory underpinning the success of the flipped classroom model.

Cognitive schema theory is a knowledge representation form that the brain organically combines new things with existing knowledge and experiences to facilitate information storage and processing. It is a complete information system composed of interrelated knowledge (Zhao, 2001). The process of classroom teaching and student learning ultimately involves the process of students combining existing cognitive schemas to fill in new information and make the schemas more concrete. The entire learning process is guided by cognitive schemas, which activate or construct appropriate cognitive schemas and fill them with new information. This process changes with changes in the teaching mode. Existing and newly constructed cognitive schemas not only provide information frameworks for assimilating new information, but also connect information to activate readers' existing cognitive schemas. Therefore, cognitive schema knowledge plays a decisive role in learning. Many scholars use cognitive schema theory as a theoretical basis to guide practical teaching, but few have explained the flipped classroom from this perspective. This article explains the reason for the success of the flipped classroom model from the perspective of cognitive schema theory, which has certain theoretical and practical significance.