Development of the Electronic Books for Teachers to Manage Integrative Thinking Instruction for 21st Century Students

Abstract

This research and development aimed to 1) explore teachers’ opinions towards thinking skills required for managing integrative thinking instruction for 21^st century students; 2) develop the electronic books for teachers to manage integrative thinking instruction; and 3) investigate the effectiveness of the developed electronic books in terms of knowledge and design of integrative thinking lesson plans, teachers’ opinions towards the developed electronic books, evaluation of students’ integrative thinking, and students’ opinions towards integrative thinking instruction. The samples were 1) 24 teachers from 4 learning areas: science, mathematics, foreign languages, and Thai language; the school were selected purposively and 6 teachers from each learning area were selected using a simple random sampling method; 2) students from 8 classes, randomly selected from classes of the teacher sampling group, 2 classes from each learning area, totaling 275 students. The research instruments included 1) the opinion questionnaires, 2) the electronic books, 3) the content validity checklist (IOC), 4) the cognitive assessment form for integrative thinking instruction, and 5) the assessment form for the ability to design integrative thinking lesson plans, 6) the assessment form for students’ integrative thinking, 7) the structure interview. Statistics used in this research were the percentage, IOC, mean scores, standard deviation, t-test for dependent samples, and z-test. The findings revealed that 1) the electronic books consisted of 3 sets of interactive books including fundamental thinking skills leading to integrative thinkers, development of integrative thinking skills, and evaluation of integrative thinking; 2) the average posttest scores of teachers’ knowledge concerning integrative thinking instruction after learning from the electronic books were significantly higher than those pretest scores at 0.05 level. Twenty-four teachers (100%) passed the set criteria of not less than 70% concerning knowledge and design of integrative thinking lesson plans. The level of teachers’ opinions towards the electronic books was at the highest level (=3.58, S.D.=0.34). The level of students’ opinions towards integrative thinking instruction was at the highest level (=3.49, S.D.=0.33). The average scores of students’ integrative thinking were higher than the criteria of 70% at the 0.05 significance level. There were 210 students, which accounted for 76.23%, passing the set criteria at 70% on integrative thinking evaluation.