THE EFFECT OF PROJECT-BASED LEARNING WITH AN ECOPEDAGOGICAL APPROACH ON THE ENVIRONMENTAL KNOWLEDGE AND CREATIVITY OF HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS

Abstract

This study aims to determine the effects of project-based learning with an eco-pedagogical approach on students' environmental knowledge and creativity, and to examine the relationship between environmental knowledge and creativity in the context of environmental pollution. This study employed a quasi-experimental design with a pretest-posttest control group. The study sample consisted of students in Class X-3 as the experimental group and Class X-1 as the control group, selected through cluster random sampling. Data were collected using test and non-test instruments and analyzed using the Independent Samples t-test and Pearson's product-moment correlation. The results showed that the posttest average score for environmental knowledge in the experimental class (88.61) was higher than that of the control class (75.00). Creativity scores based on the observation sheet were 80.99% for the experimental class and 61.63% for the control class, while product assessments were 87.50% and 71.35%, respectively. Hypothesis testing for knowledge and creativity yielded a significance value of 0.000 < 0.05. Furthermore, there was a very strong positive relationship between students' environmental knowledge and creativity, with a significance value of 0.000 < 0.05 and a correlation coefficient of 0.830. These results indicate that the PjBL model with an eco-pedagogical approach can serve as a learning solution to develop students' environmental knowledge and creativity in the context of environmental pollution.