Title: GENDER EFFECTS OF REFLECTIVE TEACHING AND PROBLEM-BASED LEARNING ON STUDENTS' ACQUISITION OF 21ST CENTURY SKILLS IN BASIC TECHNOLOGY

Authors:
Ozoagu, Fidelis O. & Igboko, Kingsley O.

Abstract: Abstract The study focused on the relative effects of reflective teaching (RT) and problem-based learning (PBL) on gender in relation to students‟ acquisition of 21st century skills in Basic Technology. Four research questions and four hypotheses guided the study. The non-equivalent control group design was adopted. Two JSS 3 intact classes were used. The pretest and posttest consisted of the construction of a building model, and the installation and activation of solar panels for green energy, respectively. The projects were validated by three industrial technical education experts from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka and Rivers State University of Science and Technology, Portharcout. The reliability of the projects was determined using the Kuder-Richardson Formular 20 technique and the coefficients were .84 for the construction of a building model and .81for the installation and activation of solar panels. The projects were assessed through process evaluation using an adapted instrument on four domains of 21st century skills namely, digital age literacy, inventive thinking, effective communication and high productivity. Mean and standard deviation were used to answer the research questions while the hypotheses were tested using ANCOVA at .05 level of significance. The findings indicated that though there was general improvement in the performance of the students following the application of the two instructional strategies, boys taught with reflective teaching performed significantly better on inventive thinking and high productivity skills while girls taught with the same method performed significantly better on digital age literacy and effective communication skills. However, in the PBL, boys performed significantly better than girls on inventive thinking while no significant difference was observed in their mean scores on digital age literacy, effective communication and high productivity skills. Among the findings is that gender has some influence on the extent to which each of the two teaching methods affects students‟ acquisition of 21st century skills in Basic Technology. However, PBL should be given more emphasis as it has shown to be less gender-biased than the reflective teaching method.

Publication Date: 2018-12-06