The effects of the jigsaw method on CFSIIUM students` understanding of biology concepts and critical thinking skills

Abstract

The purpose of the quasi-experimental study was to examine the effects of the Jigsaw method on Biological Science students' conceptual understanding of Biology and their critical thinking skills. The subjects were 57 CFSIIUM students who were studying Biology II, SHF1425 in Semester 3, 2012/2013. The students were divided into two groups, control and experimental groups. The control group did not undergo the Jigsaw treatment and attended regular lectures whereas the experimental group was treated with the Jigsaw method. Three different pre-tests and post-tests of Assessment of Understanding Biology for Biological Science (AUBBS) were administered to determine the gain scores whereas Cornell Critical Thinking Test (CCTT), Level X, was administered as the pre-test and post-test to measure the development of the students' critical thinking skills. A short demographic survey was done to identify the effects of the Jigsaw method descriptively on the students' conceptual understanding of different gender and school background. The overall AUBBS total mean difference scores and CCTTX mean difference scores revealed that students who were exposed to Jigsaw did not improve significantly in their Biology conceptual understanding but improved significantly in their critical thinking skills. The female students performed better with Jigsaw in their AUBBS than the male students and the students from religious schools performed better in their AUBBS than those who came from non-religious schools. This study proved that the exposure to the Jigsaw method really gave positive effect on the students' critical thinking skills development but not their conceptual understanding of Biology. This cooperative learning method is necessary to be used in the classroom to enhance the science processing skills.