The purpose of this study was to find out whether there was any difference in adolescents' decision making abilities according to the level of critical thinking in practical problem-based instruction of Home Economics.
The subjects of this study ware...
The purpose of this study was to find out whether there was any difference in adolescents' decision making abilities according to the level of critical thinking in practical problem-based instruction of Home Economics.
The subjects of this study ware 147 students from K girl's high school in Daegu. They were divided into two groups. The former was the experimental group, which took 'practical problem-based instruction' of Home Economics. The later was the control group, which took the typical lecture-based instruction. The both groups took the instruction of the same chapter, 'The life of consuming'. Prior to this experiment, the students had a preliminary examination and then 8 classes in Home Economics for 4 weeks.
Factor analysis, Cronbach α, correlation, and two-way ANCOVA were performed for data analysis.
The results of this study are as follows:
The practical problem-based instruction of Home Economics has a significant influence on the improvement of adolescents' decision making ability. That is, the adolescents who took the practical problem-based instruction had shown more improvement in the decision making ability than those who took the typical instruction.
First, there was no significant difference in the steps of problem identification and information search of the decision making according to teaching methods and the level of the critical thinking ability.
Second, there was significant difference in the steps of alternatives consideration and value, imagining the consequences of action, of the decision making ability according to teaching methods That is, the adolescents who took the practical problem-based instruction had shown more improvement in the steps of alternatives consideration and value of the decision making ability than those who took the typical instruction.
Third, there was significant difference in the step of decision making ability of evaluation according to the level of critical thinking ability. that is, the adolescents with the high level of critical thinking ability have made much more improvement than those with the low.
And it was found that there was a significant difference in the step of decision making abilities of the evaluation according to the level of critical thinking in terms of practical problem-based instruction of Home Economics. That is, in the case
of adolescents with the low level of critical thinking ability, those who took the practical problem-based instruction have made much more improvement than the others who took the typical instruction. On the other hand, in the case of adolescents with the high level of critical thinking ability, those who took the typical instruction improved much more than the others who took the practical problem-based instruction.
Reflecting on the result of this research, practical problem-based instruction it is more efficient than the typical instruction in the decision-making ability improvement. So we need to make our ways towards practical-problem focus helpful in solving a practical problem happening in our life out of a theory-focusing instruction in Home Economics. And in the practical problem-based instruction, we need a strategy considering the level of critical thinking ability as adolescents' trait. Finally, the result of this study has shown that for Home Economics education to play a role as a practical discipline, we need to develop the instruction model focusing on practical problem in various fields of Home Economics education.