A SURVEY ON THE STAKEHOLDERS’ VIEWS ON IMPLEMENTING A ‘FLIPPED CLASSROOM’ IN THE CURRENT SRI LANKAN SCHOOL CONTEXT

Abstract

Flipped Classroom [FC] refers to a form of blended teaching and learning where the traditional classroom environment is ‘flipped’ 1800 with the tangible-spacial classroom being extended by means of a virtual one. This paper presents the preliminary findings of an on-going research on the practicality of implementing a FC in the Sri Lankan School Context. The research identified Students, Teachers, School Administration and Parents as the major stakeholders and four questionnaires were administered to 10 school administrators (head-masters, head-mistresses, school board members and/ or mangers), 20 teachers, 50 students and 20 parents affiliated to different schools in the Western Province of Sri Lanka in order to ascertain their perspectives and insights into the adaptation of a FC. Cross-referencing of these data with respect to gender, grade taught / learnt in and teaching/ learning medium (English, Tamil, Sinhala and mixed) revealed interesting viewpoints on this matter. The paper draws upon these survey findings along with the data from selected interviews, secondary sources as well as researcher’s observations and concludes the findings under four main topics; a) The Digital Divide; FC’s extreme dependency on the computer and the internet along with the digital divide which exists in the country at present would make its implementation unfair for certain groups of Sts, b) Teacher’s Conundrum; Not all teachers are equally competent in technology and it might be unfair to expect certain digital immigrants to assimilate into the constant use of advanced technology in their classrooms, c) The Students Psyche and d) The Parental Factor; The majority of the students and parents are not ready to deviate from the traditional way of teaching and learning due to the implications it might have on certain high-stake examinations. The paper concludes that the major stakeholders unite in discouraging the implementation of a FC in the school system; in the current state of affairs it would pose more challenges than advantages to the Sri Lankan school education system.