Cultivating communication through PBL with ICT

Abstract Communication plays an essential role in the Biology education. It focuses on delivery and transmission of knowledge. In problem-based learning (PBL), communication is seen as a fundamental skill that has to be developed and used by the students. During the PBL sessions, students are required to read out the problems, gather feedback from their peers, find a solution and lastly do a group presentation. All this steps require communication skills throughout the PBL process. Quasi experiment with the non-equivalent control group design was used for this study. The research design is non-equivalent control group design with posttest only. There were two experimental groups and one control group involved in the study. The first experimental group was exposed with PBL with ICT treatment whilst the second experimental group was exposed with PBL treatment. Meanwhile the control group was exposed with the conventional teaching method. Eighty samples were involved in the study. Communication skills were measured using a rubric at the end of the treatment. The data was analyzed using quantitative measure which is mainly ANOVA. Findings showed that the PBL with ICT group had the highest score in communication skills. The implications of the study suggested that an integration of ICT in PBL is seen effective in cultivating communication skills for higher education.