Exploration of the Flipped Classroom Educational Model for Cognitive Education of Specialized Computer Majors

Fostered by advancements of information technologies, especially those in big data, cloud computing and artificial intelligence, undergraduate computer science education is becoming more specified and refined, and numerous sub-majors are developed to meet specific societal demands. Being an interdisciplinary, comprehensive, and fast-developing subject with limited public awareness, professional cognition and engineering literacy are at the core of an introductory course that aims to materialize the spirit of emerging engineering education. Based on a framework that conducts demand identification, plan design, and implementation pathway in a logical order, we develop a flipped classroom model for our introductory course of Spatial Information and Digital Technology. Guided by the idea of backward design, the course objective is framed with consideration of graduation objectives and the characteristics of freshmen. This flipped classroom model is task-oriented and synthesizes individual and collaborative learning to engage the students and cultivate their problem-solving skills. The model incorporates several managerial innovations to guarantee the efficacy, including interdisciplinary teaching teams, blended learning strategies, and process-oriented evaluation. These measures not only optimize the teaching procedure, but also offer the students broader resources and more opportunities for practice. In conclusion, our introductory course framework successfully puts forward a route of cultivating the professional identity and engineering literacy of freshmen, which constitutes an attempt strongly supportive of the emerging engineering education.