Improving motivation and learning outcome in a flipped classroom environment

A successful flipped classroom teaching highly depends on the students' capacity for studying new material on their own in order to attend classes well-prepared. In a first year engineering course pencasts were used to help students with this task. Compared to video lectures this is a low cost and easy to use technology. Combined with an enquiry based teaching at class the proposed learning strategy was well-received by students indicating an increase in motivation as well as in learning outcome.