Dental students in an orthodontic course flipped classroom: A semi-experimental study on knowledge, practice, attitude, and satisfaction

Objective: The purpose of this study was to determine the students' attitudes before and after the flipped classroom, and the effectiveness of this method to promote the students' lateral cephalograms tracing abilities, students' satisfaction and their final exam scores. Materials and Methods: This is a single-group quasi-experimental research conducted on dental students of Shiraz University of Medical Sciences (SUMS), Iran in 2019. The intervention was carried out in a blended learning approach with the flipped classroom model. Thirty-five fourth-year dental students participated in a flipped classroom held during a semester for the lateral cephalograms tracing course. The students were provided with the educational materials before the class time through multimedia learning tools and the class time was devoted to discussions. The students were asked to fill out four questionnaires (pretest/posttest attitudes, pretest/posttest self-assessments of theoretical knowledge and practical skills in cephalograms, posttest of satisfaction from quality of the course, and posttest of students' views about effectiveness of blended learning tools) and final exam scores of students. Results: Students' attitudes toward e-Learning were improved after the flipped classroom and the quality of this method was acceptable to the students (p < .001). Their self-assessment of theoretical knowledge and practical skills were promoted (p < .001). While all blended learning tools averaged more than the cut-off-point, short lecture (5.11 +/- 0.98) and live feedback (4.98 +/- 1.07) were considered to be the most efficient interactive tools. Conclusion: It seems that the flipped classroom has a positive effect on increasing students' knowledge, attitude, and satisfaction. In general, this method of learning seems to be favored by dental students. Clinical Significance: The findings showed that blended learning had a positive effect on increasing knowledge, performance, and satisfaction among dental students. Therefore, blended learning as a reliable method might be used in training dental students.