Fostering students’ 21st century skills through Project Oriented Problem Based Learning (POPBL) in integrated STEM education program

BITARA-STEM Program

Learning by doing is a way to help students to understand and gain meaningful learning especially the abstract content effectively. One of the methods to promote learning by doing is called POPBL. Students learn how to solve real world problems based on authentic and real life experiences through project work that emphasizes the creation of artefacts. The success of the project work comes from the collaboration between students by working in teams while the teacher acts as the facilitator. Designing POPBL approach with integrated STEM is still new in the learning environment. In this study, a program called ‘BITARA-STEM Program’ was conducted for six days. This program implemented POPBL in the STEM education program. The learning activities in this program were project-based. They consisted of multi-disciplinary activities that provided students with fun learning that are based on student-centred approach. Implementation of POPBL with integrated STEM in this program was carried out in order to develop 21st century skills, higher-order thinking and research skills among the students. Four separate units of modules were introduced to the students for them to participate in, namely (i) Energy, (ii) Urban infrastructure, (iii) Transportation, and (iv) Wireless communication (Table 1).

Table 1 Units of intervention and activities

Unit	Modules	Example of Activities
Energy	Introduction to Newton’s Law &Electrical Basics Worldly environment Power generation Power storage Biomimicry	Balloon rocket & parachute. Rain in the bottle Potato battery Hydrogen fuel cell Fish tail
Transportation	Modes of transport Smart transportation Smart highways Intelligent transportation systems Traffic engineering	Make a circuit Robot programming
Wireless Communication	Smart electronics basics Real time communication Space based wireless communication Internet and communication network Smart wireless communication	Flash LED Cell antenna
Urban Infrastructure	Environmental engineering Soil and land development Building towards the future Recycling and waste management Natural disasters	Pump It! Water turbine Earthquake Town

This study employs the pre-test post-test quasi experimental design. We realized the limitations of this method. However, as an exploratory study, one pre- post test approached is deemed acceptable.

Respondents
The respondents in this study comprised of 125 lower secondary school students (age 13-14 years old). The majority of the participants obtained excellent results in the national examination for Standard Six (12 years old) also known as the Primary School Evaluation Test (UPSR), where 60.7% and 77.9% of the participants scored ‘A’ for science and mathematics subject, respectively.

Instrument and Procedure
The instrument used in this research is a set of questionnaire which employed the Likert Scale with five degrees of agreement (1=strongly disagree to 5=strongly agree) in measuring students’ perception of their 21st century skills. The instrument used was adapted from Arsad (2011) which takes into consideration the skill components from enGauge 21st century skills, namely (i) Digital age literacy, (ii) Inventive thinking, (iii) Effective communication, and (iv) High productivity, with the additional component of Spiritual values which is a component that is adapted to suit the Malaysian Education Philosophy. This instrument has been checked and verified by experts (construct validation, content and language). The instrument has acceptable and good credibility (George & Mallery, 2003) with all constructs achieving a high Cronbach Alpha value of between 0.78-0.86 in the pilot study (Table 2).

Table 2. The Cronbach Alpha Value for 21st century skill elements and Example of Items

Element	Cronbach Alpha	Item	Number of items
Digital age literacy	0.83	I can understand the concept of science and mathematics that the teacher teaches in English. I am able to evaluate the information regarding science.	7
Inventive thinking	0.77	I can be positive towards the problem with level of difficulty that is beyond my expectation. I am interested to find out new and unusual things that I can find from the surrounding	12
Effective communication	0.81	I act as a leader and follower at the same time in completing the assignment. I collaborate with team members in any circumstances.	8
High productivity	0.74	I plan the time provided to complete each assignment. I create product from my project or practical science.	8
Spiritual values	0.85	I am thankful because I am able to learn science and mathematics. I always associate the science knowledge needed in the world or the hereafter.	5

Participants of the program answered the questionnaire before and after the experiencing the BITARA STEM program.

Analysis

Mean scores for each aspect of the 21st century skills investigated were determined. Paired sample t- test was used to identify the differences of mean scores between pre and post tests. In addition, the mean scores were divided into three categories. The categories were i) low level – mean score 1.00 to 2.33; ii) moderate level – mean score 2.34 to 3.67 and iii) high level – mean score 3.68 to 5.00 (William, 2003).