Student Engagement, Motivation, and Active Learning in K–12 Flipped Classrooms: A Systematic Literature Review of Benefits and Strategies
Flipped instruction has received attention in K–12 education for the potential to increase student engagement, motivation, and active learning by combining technology and redesign of the teaching and learning process. The purpose of this study is to determine the recent trends and the main findings of literature studies related to flipped classrooms in K-12 education in order to find the most common investigated themes of the studies, the research methods used, and to look at the benefits of flipped classrooms in those. The review was conducted based on the PRISMA 2020 framework to maintain rigor and transparency. The electronic databases including Science Direct, ProQuest and Scopus were reviewed from January 2020 to December 2024 for peer-reviewed articles. Twenty-nine articles were chosen as relevant by content analysis. The results showed that research on the flipped classroom model in K–12 education was a new area of research, with a notable increase in the number of publications in the last five years. The most commonly employed designs were mixed-methods and quantitative. The prevalent topics were student engagement, motivation, and active learning. The results of the studies found that the flipped classroom approach is significantly increasing the learning process in terms of interaction, independent work, and active participation in the class. Nevertheless, a lack of studies in the higher secondary school and on several stakeholders (e.g., the parents and school leaders) was underlined. The flipped classroom model presents notable benefits for K–12 education, but further research is needed to explore its challenges, particularly in underrepresented contexts. Practical recommendations for educators to help increase implementation and for further research into the benefits and limitations of this strategy are included.