The effects of inquiry-based learning and learning styles on primary school students’ conceptual understanding in multimedia learning environment

Abstract

This research aimed to identify the effects of inquiry-based learning on the conceptual understanding of students with various learning styles in the multimedia learning environment. This research was factorial experiment with the quasi-ex-perimental design. There were total of 157 primary school students in Bali, Indonesia being involved as the subjects of the study. There were two instruments used in this research. The first instrument was a questionnaire adapted from Index of Learning Style (ILS) developed by Felder and Soloman for measuring the verbal-visual learning styles. The second instrument was the conceptual understanding test for measuring students’ conceptual understanding in the form of multiple-choice test. The research discovered three findings as follows: (1) there is a significant difference in terms of conceptual understanding between students who are taught by inquiry-based learning and direct instruction strategy, (2) there is a significant difference in terms of students conceptual understanding between visual and verbal students, (3) there is a significant interaction between different learning strategies (inquiry based learning and direct instruction strategy) and students’ learning styles (visual verbal) toward students conceptual understanding.