Effectiveness of Flipped Classrooms for K-12 Students: Evidence From a Three-Level Meta-Analysis

Flipped classrooms (FCs) in K-12 schools are growing in popularity. However, previous studies have reported inconsistent findings on the effects of FCs, and the conditions under which FCs are effective remain unclear. This three-level meta-analysis synthesized the effects of FCs versus traditional classrooms (TCs) on various learning domains among K-12 students based on 129 studies with 399 effect sizes (N = 12,727). The results revealed that FCs have a significant positive effect on K-12 students' overall performance (without outliers: g = 0.53 [0.44,0.62], 95% prediction interval [-0.60, 1.66]) and on both the cognitive domain and the affective domain. Moderator analyses showed that region, measured outcome, outcome dilution, instructor equivalence, and publication type were significant predictors. In addition, the educational context and research methodology characteristics accounted for a significant proportion of the variability in overall effects. These findings provide valuable evidence-based recommendations for future research and practice.