Student Questionnaire on PBL Activities in phase I

Table 4.3 depicts the student questionnaire and the cumulative statistics of students’ responses. The questions are regrouped by categories for easier interpretation and better understanding of the data. Furthermore, check mark percentages in the

―Strongly Agree‖ and ―Agree‖ boxes as well as check mark percentages in the ―Strongly Disagree‖ and ―Disagree‖ boxes are summed into two categories, respectively. Therefore, only three columns of statistics, agree/strongly agree, neutral, and disagree/strongly disagree, are shown in the table. The data in the table represents cumulative responses among the 16 classes that participated in the experiment. Although statistics among different classes are various, our analysis on individual class responses shows that the variations are insignificant. Except in a few cases, the standard deviations of responses to each of the questions among the 16 classes are all less than 10%. The highest deviation of any class in any question is 14%. Therefore, the cumulative result is not adversely affected by any single class.

1. PBL vs. Traditional Lectures

At the beginning of the project, although the teacher encouraged students to choose a topic that interested them but they knew little about, almost a third (Question 1, 27%) of the groups still chose topics that are familiar to them. However, most students did learn something new, regardless of their familiarity with the topic chosen (Question 2, 82%). When asked to compare PBL and regular in-class lecturing, only about half of the students favored the new PBL approach (Question 3, 45%) and showed higher in-class participation level (Question 4, 55%). This is not surprising since the students in Taiwan are still very much used to the passive learning style. When asked about future PBL activities, over half of the students would like to participate in future PBL activities (Question 5, 57%). With only 11% (Question 5) unwilling to participate in more PBL

activities, and given the perceived learning in the process, structured PBL in high school computer classes is workable and should be encouraged.

Table 4.3 Student questionnaire and cumulative results over all 16 classes in phase I 1. Before this project, I knew very little about our topic of

choice.

39% 34% 27%

2. From this project, I gained much knowledge about our topic of choice.

82% 16% 2%

3. I can learn more doing my own research as opposed to listening to lectures in class.

45% 45% 10%

4. During the project weeks, my in class participation is much better than other weeks of school.

55% 42% 3%

5. If given the opportunity, I’d like to participate in project-based learning activities in the future.

57% 32% 11%

6. Our final project report is content rich. 56% 38% 6%

7. Our final project report is well organized. 66% 30% 4%

8. Our final project report contains artistic illustrations. 45% 45% 10%

9.. I understand all the content in our final project report. 84% 13% 3%

10. Overall, I am satisfied with everything in our final project report.

69% 23% 8%

11. Our final project report meets or exceeds all the criteria set forth by the teacher.

56% 35% 6%

12. We did a good job on our oral presentation of the final project report.

63% 27% 10%

13. I gave my full attention during other groups’ oral presentations.

77% 22% 1%

14. I learned something new from other groups’ oral presentations.

75% 22% 3%

15. Our group distributed work evenly among group members. 56% 33% 11%

16. Everyone on our group gave their best effort on the assigned job.

82% 14% 4%

17. My effort and contribution to the group is not self-satisfactory. 37% 35% 28%

18. I had difficult time meeting our group’s expectations. 16% 52% 32%

19. I didn’t know how to use ―Publisher‖ before the class. 81% 11% 8%

20. After the demonstration in class, I was ready to create a newsletter and pamphlets for our project.

81% 16% 3%

21. As the project rolled along, I became more skillful at operating information technology equipment (i.e., software and hardware).

76% 22% 2%

22. I have now mastered the ―Publisher‖ software. 66% 31% 3%

2. Quality of Work

Overall, most of the students feel good about the overall quality of their work. In particular, more students feel more confident about the contents and the organization of their final reports than the artistic aspect of the report (Question 6, 56% and Question 7, 66%, as oppose to Question 8, 45%). However, fewer than 10% of the students thought improvement is needed in any of the three aspects. It is also gratifying to see that most of the students understand everything that went into their final reports (Question 9, 84%). In all, 69% of students are satisfied with the job they have done while only 8% thought otherwise (Question 10). Furthermore, over half (Question 11, 56%) of the students indicated that they have done a better job than is required of them while only 6% thought otherwise (Question 11).

3. Oral Presentation

The oral presentation was required for all groups and was meant to give students more exposure to other IT topics and to foster their presentation skills. From the questionnaire results, it seems that the first objective was achieved. Students gave their attention during others’ presentations (Question 13, 77%) and learned something new from others’ presentations (Question 14, 75%). This would indicate that the contents of the oral presentations were at students’ level of knowledge and the presentations were not dull. Indeed, a majority of the students thought they had done a good job on the oral presentation (Question 12, 63%).

4. Group Work

From Question 15, we see that over half of the students agreed that the distribution of the workload in this project was fair (56%), while 33% were indifferent and only 11% questioned the fairness of the workload. However, an overwhelming majority of the students thought that everyone gave their best effort regardless of the workload distribution (Question 16, 82%). When asked about their own efforts, students are more critical of themselves. From Question 17, only 28% of the students were satisfied with their own effort and contribution while 37% were not. When asked about difficulties encountered in accomplishing their assigned jobs (Question 18), although only 16% admitted that they had a difficult time meeting their group’s expectations, many others also described the problems they faced in the open space provided. In all, most students indicated that there was not enough time.

5. Software Skill Acquisition

One of the objectives of this PBL was to have students gain deeper operational knowledge and skills at using the ―MS-Publisher‖ software taught in class. Questions 19 through 22 addressed this issue. At the beginning of the project, a majority of the students didn’t know how to use MS-Publisher (Question 19, 81%) and most were eager to try creating printable documents with Publisher after only one class of usage demonstration (Question 20, 81%). In addition, 76% of students thought that they are becoming more skillful in using the PC in many different aspects (Question 21). Some students developed better web surfing strategies for finding related materials for inclusion in their project report, while others were becoming more skillful at different software. Still some cherished the chance to use computer accessories, for example, a digital camera, scanner, and color printer, for academic purposes. Finally, about one third of the students thought they had mastered the MS-Publisher software (Question 22, 66%). The reason that this

number is not higher is probably because not all students were involved in the actual production of the final report. Due to time constraints, many groups relegated the task of the final report production to those who have a computer at home. It is also interesting to note that only between 2% and 3% of students did not think they had acquired more software and/or hardware skills through participation in this project (Questions 20-22, 3%, 2%, and 3% respectively). Since each class has between 45 and 48 students, this translates to an average of only one to two students not gaining more operational skills in class.