Improving Students' Scientific Literacy Through Problem Based Learning

Abstract

Scientific literacy ability is one of the competencies that students must have in this era of globalization. The purpose of this study was to determine the increase in students' scientific literacy skills through the application of problem based learning. This research was conducted using classroom action research methods in the Engineering Physics course. Each indicator of scientific literacy has increased from cycle I to cycle II. The scientific literacy context indicator increased from 67.86% to 82.14%, the knowledge indicator increased from 60.71% to 85.71%. Competency indicators also progressed from 53.57% to 78.57%, while attitude indicators experienced a fairly high increase from 42.86% to 75%. This indicates that students' scientific literacy skills can be improved through problem based learning. Therefore, this problem-based learning model needs to be applied at the tertiary level to be able to hone and develop scientific literacy skills that exist in students.