Effectiveness of Using the Project-Based Learning Model in Improving Creative-Thinking Ability

Abstract

To facilitate students' learning, the task of the teacher is not only to provide subject matter but also to explain the practical benefits to students, pursued dynamically by giving students to engage actively to explore the opportunity, problems and challenges by project-based learning to gain deeper and contextual knowledge. To verify the extent to which, the Project-Based Learning (PjBL) model is carried out to examine students' contextual abilities. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effectiveness of using the project-based learning model in improving the ability to think creatively on economic subjects at high-school students in West Bandung Regency, West Java, Indonesia. The method was quasi experiments by classifying the respondents to the experimental class and the control class. The data was collected from a sample of 79 students. The results showed that there were differences in creative thinking between the use of project-based learning models in the experimental class compared with the use of expository methods in the control class. These findings demonstrated that project-based learning has the potential to provide interesting and relevant learning experiences for students. Theoretically, this finding confirms about the need for teachers to evaluate the results of student performance products during the project-based learning process. The findings practically emphasize the focus of learning with project-based learning and other meaningful tasks, by giving students the opportunity to work autonomously in constructing knowledge and for make products.