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the students need to work collaboratively in small and
heterogeneous groups, helping each other to learn a
specific assignment to achieve a common goal
(Strother, 1990; Kagan, 1994). Compared to
individualistic learning, this approach is proven to
improve students' performance (Johnson and
Johnson, 1999; Slavin, 1999). To be effective; the
cooperative learning must be well-planned and
structured with learning materials available to all
participants (Azmin, 2015). There are several types of
cooperative learning. The Jigsaw strategy is one of
them.
Elliot Aroston originally introduced and used the
Jigsaw instructional procedure in 1971 in Austin,
Texas to help the students develop their social and
cooperative skills (Aronson and Bridgemen, 1979).
With this approach, the content of the lesson is
divided into several parts of information, just like in
jigsaw puzzle. The students are also divided into
several heterogenous groups consist of 5-6 students
refered to as the ‘jigsaw’ group, where they are each
given a specific subtopic. In the next step, students
break out of their jigsaw groups and form ‘expert’
groups, where they focus on one subtopic,
researching and discussing it and become experts on
the subtopic that they have been assigned to. Next, the
students return to their jigsaw groups and teach their
peers based on their discussions in the expert group.
Eventually, all the members of the jigsaw groups will
have learnt from each expert group discussion and
will have benefit from each other (Azmin, 2015). In
this method, the lecturer acts as a motivator,
facilitator and assesses students activities.
2 METHOD
The classroom action research conducted this study.
Learning strategy used a combination of a Teacher-
Centered Learning (TCL) approach and cooperative
learning using a jigsaw strategy.
2.1 Population and Participants
The population of this study was all students who
took Mathematical Statistics I in the academic year
2017/2018. The students were grouped into three
classes labeled A, B and C, consisting of 33, 34 and
30 students respectively. All members of the
population participated in this study.
2.2 Study Design
This classroom action research was carried out during
the even semester of the academic year 2017/2018.
This research was done in two cycles, each cycle
consisting of 4 steps, as follows:
Step 1: Planning. At this stage, a strategy was
designed to achieve the learning objectives,
starting from identifying the problems that
arose in the learning process of the
Mathematics Statistics I course, analyzing
the causes and then developing an action
plan through the development of the
Semester Learning Plan and students’
worksheets for lectures and tutorials. In this
activity, an indicator of the success of the
action was also determined. This step was
conducted through week 1-5.
Step 2: Implementation. At this stage, actions that
had been planned were implemented. The
chosen Jigsaw strategy was used. This
strategy was applied to two specific topics
(a) The Properties of Expectation Values, (b)
Special Discrete Distribution and also
applied to the tutorial class. This step was
conducted through week 6-10.
Step 3: Observation. At this stage, observations
were carried out to identify events
encountered in the implementation of the
action, which included obstacles
encountered and activities carried out by
students during the learning process. This
activity was conducted in conjunction with
the implementation step.
Step 4: Reflection. The last stage of this research was
the evaluation of the results of actions taken
based on predetermined indicators.
2.3 Data Collection and Analysis
Data were collected during the implementation step.
The collected data were the scores of the exams,
quizzes and students' perceptions of the effect of this
learning method on the active involvement of
students, motivation to learn material independently
and teamwork improvement. The measurement of
students’ opinion was carried out by distributing
questionnaires to all students. The questionnaire used
a Likert scale. Data were analyzed using descriptive
statistics (central tendency and variability measures)
as well as statistical tables and graphs.
Effectiveness of The Jigsaw Strategy on Students Achievement in Mathematical Statistics I Course
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