Developing Critical Thinking Skills of Grade 9 Students Through Problem-based Learning (PBL)
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Abstract
The purposes of this research were 1) to develop PBL lesson plans in order to increase critical thinking
skills of Grade 9 students, that meet the 80/80 efficiency criterion, 2) to find out the effectiveness index of
PBL activities on critical thinking skills of Grade 9 students, 3) to compare critical thinking scores of Grade 9
students before and after the intervention, and 4) to find out Grade 9 students’ satisfaction towards the use of
PBL. The samples of the study, selected through the cluster random sampling technique, were 38 students
from Class 3/12 at Kalasinpittayasan School under the jurisdiction of Secondary Education Office Service
Area 1 during the second semester of the academic year 2016. The research tools consisted of 1) four lesson
plans covering sixteen hours to increase students’ critical thinking skills, 2) an achievement test to measure
students’ critical thinking skills, which covered 30 questions in the form of both written and multiple-choice
items, and 3) a satisfaction form based on the 5-point scale that contained 15 items to determine how much
Grade 9 students were satisfied with the use of PBL in their learning. The statistics used included mean,
percentage, standard deviation and t-test.The study results revealed that:
1. The PBL lesson plans to increase students’ critical thinking skills obtained the 86.61/82.80 efficiency
that complied with the established 80/80 criterion.
2. The effectiveness index in terms of student engagement in PBL activities which aimed at enhancing
students’ critical thinking skills was 0.6194, thus indicating that the students’ posttest scores were higher than
the pretest scores by 61.94%.
3. Grade 9 students involved in the lesson plans that aimed to enhance their critical thinking skills gained
the posttest scores that were higher than the pretest scores, significantly at the .05 level.
4. Grade 9 students’ satisfaction towards the learning activities based on the PBL approach designed
to enhance their critical thinking skills was overall at the ‘highly satisfied’ level ( = 4.35).
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