Effectiveness of Arts Integrated Learning (AIL) in Developing Conceptual Understanding in Geography at Elementary Level

Abstract

Arts Integrated Learning (AIL) is an innovative and cross-curricular approach to teaching and learning, which integrates different arts form with school subjects. It is relevant to study the effectiveness of AIL in developing conceptual understanding in geography and to compare the effectiveness of AIL in developing conceptual understanding among boys and girls and high achievers and low achievers at elementary level. The pre-test–post-test quasi-experimental design was carried out by the researcher with AIL as the independent variable and conceptual understanding as the dependent variable. In this study, sex and level of achievement were used as categorical variable. The researcher has selected 68 students of two sections of seventh grade from Derozio Mission High School, North 24 Parganas, West Bengal, India as a sample. The sample of the present study was selected by purposive sampling technique but groups were assigned randomly. Self developed lesson plans based on AIL in geography for class VII were used as instructional tool and self developed achievement test on geography as measuring toos in the present study. The experiment was carried out for 15 days in the selected school. The collected data were analysed by using inferential statistics such as t-test and accordingly interpretations were made. The study indicated that using AIL in classroom teaching significantly develops the conceptual understanding of students in geography as compared to the traditional method of teaching geography and the AIL was equally effective for both boys and girls. It also reveals that AIL was significantly effective in developing conceptual understanding for high achievers than low achievers. The study has suggested for orientation of elementary school teachers in AIL for making them skilled in AIL for teaching all school subjects. Further, AIL must find a place in the pre-service teacher education curriculum and must be integrated in pedagogy courses and practised during internship in teaching.