EFFECTS OF STEM EDUCATION ENHANCED WITH ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE ON CRITICAL THINKING IN THE PLANT KINGDOM AMONG BACHELOR OF EDUCATION STUDENTS IN BIOLOGY
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Abstract
This research aimed to: 1) to develop instructional learning activities based on STEM education integrated with Artificial Intelligence (AI) to enhance students' critical thinking skills, matching the efficiency criterion of 80/80; 2) to compare the critical thinking skills of undergraduate biology education students before and after experiencing the learning activities; and 3) to investigate the overall satisfaction of undergraduate students toward the developed learning activities. The sample group utilized in this study consisted of 19 undergraduate students majoring in biology education at Ubon Ratchathani Rajabhat University, who were selected through a purposive sampling method. The research methodology employed a one-group pretest-posttest design.
The comprehensive research instruments utilized for data collection included:
1) structured lesson plans; 2) a standardized critical thinking assessment test; and
3) a satisfaction evaluation questionnaire. The collected data were statistically analyzed using mean, standard deviation, and a dependent samples t-test. The research results were found as follows: 1) The efficiency of the developed learning activities reached 82.54/86.32, which substantially exceeded the pre-established 80/80 efficiency criterion. 2) The students' post-intervention critical thinking skills were statistically significantly higher than their pre-intervention scores at the .05 level Specifically, the mean score significantly increased from 9.53 before the intervention to 25.80 after the implementation (Mean Difference = 16.26, 95% CI = 13.88–18.65, t(18) = 14.34, p < .001, Cohen's
dz = 3.29). Sub-dimension analysis further indicated that the specific aspect of "evaluation of arguments" exhibited the highest level of improvement. 3) The students expressed the highest level of satisfaction toward the developed learning activities, yielding an average score of 4.61. These findings explicitly demonstrate that integrating Artificial Intelligence as an augmented learning system within STEM education activities can effectively support and enhance students' critical thinking skills.
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