Constructivist Flipped Learning as a Recursive Knowledge Transformation Cycle

Background. Flipped learning has been widely implemented to reorganize learning activities across pre class, in class, and post class environments. However, existing models often emphasize instructional inversion and activity sequencing without adequately explaining how learners transform prior understanding into reconstructed knowledge.

Purpose. This conceptual study develops the Constructivist Flipped Learning Cycle (CFLC), an integrative theoretical model explaining knowledge transformation through cognitive and social constructivist mechanisms.

Method. The study employed a conceptual theory-building design comprising targeted literature identification, theoretical comparison, conceptual synthesis, framework development, and proposition formulation. Relevant perspectives on flipped learning, constructivism, cognitive conflict, social negotiation, knowledge reconstruction, and metacognitive reflection were integrated into a coherent explanatory model.

Results. The CFLC comprises seven interconnected stages: prior knowledge activation, exploratory pre-class engagement, cognitive conflict, social negotiation, knowledge reconstruction, authentic application, and metacognitive reflection. These stages form a recursive cycle in which reconstructed knowledge becomes prior knowledge for subsequent learning.

Novelty. The CFLC reframes flipped learning from a temporal-spatial inversion of instruction into a knowledge-transformation architecture and introduces a mechanism-based explanation linking cognitive conflict, social negotiation, and knowledge reconstruction across interconnected learning environments.

Conclusion. The CFLC provides a theoretically grounded framework for explaining how meaningful conceptual transformation may occur in flipped learning and offers testable propositions for future empirical validation across diverse educational contexts.