A meta analysis study: is Problem Based Learning (PBL) effective toward students’ mathematical connections ability?

Abstract

PBL has become a popular topic in educational research studies. Several studies examine the effect of PBL toward students’ mathematical connection abilities. A total of 8 articles qualified for inclusion. This study analyzed them using Meta Analysis with the Comprehensive Meta-Analysis (CMA) application by selecting the Hedge’s equation to determine its effect size and bias publication was assessed by the funnel plot, and Rosenthal’s fail-safe N (FSN) test. Based on the analysis result, the overall effect size is 0.797 according to random-effect model with a 95% confidence interval (CI). It was classified as a moderate level. The findings of the study showed that the overall implementation of PBL had a larger positive effect significantly compared to conventional learning on the students’ mathematical connection’s ability. Because, in the implementation of the PBL model, students are faced with problems that are closely related to everyday life. This shows that mathematical connection ability is needed one of which is the aspects of the connection between mathematics and daily life. Doing this research can support the development of learning and can be an alternative learning model to improving students’ mathematical connections ability.