An Empirical Study Of The Influence Of Flipped Classroom On Non-English Majors’ Oral English Proficiency

As a newly emerged pedagogical method, the flipped classroom instruction contains two parts: structured student-centered and group-based learning activities inside the classroom and direct individual instruction based on online digital videos outside the classroom. However, the flipped classroom is rather than a mere re-arrangement of activities but actually represents an expansion of the curriculum. The strength of this newly rising pedagogical approach is that it can maximize learning inside the classroom, which meets the primary goal of education. The freed in-class time could be for personalized instruction identifying the needs and capabilities of individual learners, making instruction relevant and meaningful, and providing flexibility in scheduling and pacing.The present thesis is an empirical study concerning the application of flipped classroom model to college English course on the purposes of determining what benefit the flipped classroom instruction might have for students taking a college English course in terms of students’ English speaking proficiency. The study attempted to address the following two specific questions: 1. Can the application of flipped classroom instruction in college English class affect non-English majors’ oral English proficiency? 2. What is the specific influence of flipped classroom instruction on non-English majors’ oral English proficiency?A quantitative research design was employed in the present study. This study is conducted in Shandong Normal University. The first year students(N=101) from two classes majoring in Computer Science were invited to participate in an 18-week experiment. Class One(N=49) is treated as experimental class(EC) while Class Two(N=52) as control class(CC). The flipped classroom instruction was adopted in the experimental class while the traditional instruction was applied in control class. Before the experiment, a pre-speaking test was firstly carried out in both classes. After the experiment, a post-speaking test was conducted respectively in the two classes. The present study has made the following findings based on the data analysis of speaking tests:1. Flipped classroom instruction can provide favorable effect on learners’ oral English proficiency, and an effective oral English learning can be pedagogically achieved.2. The application of the flipped classroom instruction in college English class improves students’ oral English proficiency in terms of naturalness, interactivity and pronunciation particularly.The study concludes that the application of flipped classroom instruction can improve learners’ oral English proficiency. Finally, the present study reveals some pedagogical implications for the teaching and learning of spoken English in a flipped college English class. In spite of some promising findings, there still exist a number of limitations, some of which may provide possibilities for the research in the future and corresponding suggestions for future studies are presented with the hope of paving the way for more relevant studies.