Comparison of Flipped Model to Traditional Classroom Learning in a Professional Pharmacy Course

Abstract

Abstract:The flipped classroom is an approach to incorporate active learning that is being used in secondary education, higher education, and professional schools. This study investigates its impact on student learning and confidence in a professional degree program course. A quasi-experimental study was conducted to evaluate pharmacy students enrolled in a semester-long didactic traditional classroom course compared to students learning the same material using a flipped model through online self-study modules in a hands-on experiential learning course. Before and after each learning experience, students of each group completed a 16-item knowledge assessment on four topic areas and rated their level of confidence with each topic area on a Likert scale. There was a significant difference in knowledge with students in the traditional course scoring higher than students using flipped approach in the experiential course. Furthermore, the flipped experiential course students did not improve assessment scores from pre-test to post-test. For confidence rating, the traditional course group ranked confidence higher than the flipped experiential group for all topics. These findings challenge the notion that the flipped model using self-study in an experiential setting can be a substitution for didactic delivery of pharmacy education.

A Narrative Overview of the Effectiveness of E-learning in Pharmacy Education

“…E-learning was found to be a well-accepted and effective learning method in all but five [11,34,42,45,55] of the fifty-six studies reviewed. In these five studies, failure to be effective or well-accepted occurred regardless of topic or delivery method.…”

“…In three [34,42,45] of the five studies, methodological flaws may instead explain either the superior performance of the control [42,45] or the failure of the intervention to result in a significant change in a measure of effectiveness [34]. These include flawed study design introducing differences between the control and intervention groups [45]; a significantly higher baseline knowledge in the control group [42], greater incentive for the control group to learn course content [42]; loss to follow up in the control group of greater than 50% [42]; and insufficient sample size [34]. In one of these studies [11], e-learning did result in a significant improvement in the skills and/or knowledge of the participants, but the e-learning intervention was outperformed by the control and thus, could not be considered to be effective.…”

“…In the third study that did not have a positive outcome, McCabe et al, [42] compared the face-to-face and online delivery of a self-care and non-prescription medications course to pharmacy students. Students completed pre-and postcourse knowledge tests.…”

“…Learning was also assessed subjectively, through pre-, mid-and post-intervention surveys in twenty-six (46.4%) studies [11,12,[14][15][16][17][18][19]23,25,29,30,35,37,[41][42][43]45,46,50,52,56,57,59,62,64] and all but two [19,42] of these studies reported that the e-learning intervention was effective. Taglieri et al, [19] investigated the effect of completion of online virtual patient cases on student performance and confidence in mock clinic visits.…”

“…Three (5.4%) [25,55,57] of the nine studies that reviewed blended learning methods, failed to assess the effectiveness of the e-learning intervention independently of the face-to-face teaching. Twenty-six (46.4%) studies [11,12,[14][15][16][17][18][19]23,25,29,30,35,37,[41][42][43]45,46,50,52,56,57,59,62,64] measured the effectiveness of e-learning intervention on the basis of self-reported data. These findings are therefore vulnerable to response bias as well as recall bias, when participants were required to make a post-intervention assessment of their pre-intervention skills, knowledge or confidence [65,66].…”