Enhancing Polytechnic Students’ Conceptual Understanding of Kinematics Through Instruction That Integrates Metacognitive Guidance

Firmanilah Kamil; Nely Kurnila

doi:10.33394/j-ps.v14i4.22042

Authors

Firmanilah Kamil Politeknik Negeri Ketapang
Nely Kurnila Politeknik Negeri Ketapang

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.33394/j-ps.v14i4.22042

Keywords:

Conceptual understanding, Kinematics, Metacognitive prompts, Polytechnic education, Physics education

Abstract

This study aims to analyze changes in the conceptual understanding of polytechnic students following the implementation of instruction that integrates metacognitive prompts into kinematics material, as well as to describe students’ metacognitive behaviors during the learning process. The study employed a one-group pretest–posttest pre-experimental design involving 32 first-semester students in the Road and Bridge Engineering Technology (TRKJJ) program at Ketapang State Polytechnic. Data were collected through conceptual understanding tests, diagnostic tests, metacognitive prompt sheets, and metacognitive behavior observation sheets. Conceptual understanding data were analyzed using normalized gain, the paired-samples t-test, the Wilcoxon signed-rank test, and Cohen’s dz effect size, while metacognitive behavior was analyzed descriptively based on the aspects of planning, monitoring, and evaluating. The results showed that the mean conceptual understanding score increased from 14.47 (36.17%) on the pretest to 29.38 (73.44%) on the posttest. The mean N-gain value of 0.59 falls into the moderate category. The difference between pretest and posttest scores was significant based on the paired-samples t-test (t(31) = 38.24, p < 0.001) and consistent with the Wilcoxon test (p > 0.001). The effect size was Cohen’s dz = 6.76. Among the metacognitive behaviors, monitoring received the highest mean score (M = 3.20), followed by planning (M = 2.80) and evaluating (M = 2.60). These findings indicate an increase in conceptual understanding following instruction that integrated metacognitive prompts, accompanied by a predominance of monitoring behavior during the learning process. However, because the study used a design without a control group, this increase cannot be fully attributed to the metacognitive prompts.

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