In the article, the authors state that a visualization approach increases communication, critical thinking, and provides analytical approach to various problems.
The research aims to investigate visualization for the purpose of examining its role in developing students’ critical thinking. In conducting the research, the methods: quantitative and qualitative analyses were used to analyze the effect on the use of visualization in the teaching and learning process for developing critical thinking.
There were 100 Electrical and Computer Engineering students, from the University of Pristina, who answered the survey. The 100 students were divided into two groups: the control group and the experimental group. In the separation of students into groups, researchers considered the average grade to have homogeneous groups. The first group of 50 students serves as the control group (without the use of visualization), while the second is the experimental group (with the use of visualization). To accomplish the research, students from both groups answered the tests: pre-test and post-test. In addition, a questionnaire was also developed, which is the main instrument in collecting opinions of the students in the experimental group. In the questionnaire, students answered the question “Which is the effect of using visualization as a form of teaching, and teaching with whiteboard (traditional) on your learning performance and developing your critical thinking?” using an average from 5-points. Points in scale were labeled as "fully agree", "agree", "neutral", "disagree" and "strongly disagree”. The data gathered from the respondents were, then, processed. In the pre-test, the results obtained are more or less similar for both groups. However, in the post-test, the results show that students in the experimental group perform better than students from the control group. The results show that visualization has a positive effect in the teaching and learning process during the lectures. Through the use of the questionnaire, students in the experimental group were asked regarding their opinions on the impact of the integration of visualization during the teaching-learning process in comparison to the traditional way of teaching. The obtained results highlighted the positive impact that comes from the use of visualization. 95% of students (experimental group) agree that visualization offers the possibility to analyze and draw conclusions on the material examined, and 92% of students agree that visualization enables discussion and testing theoretical problems encouraging, and raising critical thinking.
Therefore, the use of visualization in the process of teaching and learning has a positive influence in increasing and developing the critical thinking of students.
Review/Critique
In obtaining quantitative data, the researchers developed their own pre-test to measure the students’ general knowledge of the course content, and post-test to measure students’ achievement for the content developed in the lecture. This method signifies that the test questions they used were not standardized because these were developed by the researchers themselves. This contradicts to the idea that standardized test questions must be given to students to obtain valid and reliable data from the students. If otherwise, researchers may end up formulating invalid inferences about the critical thinking or how students think in a particular content area. Moreover, the researchers did not specify the interval time between the giving of pre-test and post-test. This must be taken into consideration when measuring students’ conceptual understanding of the course content. This, in fact, is supported by Campbell & Stanley (1963), who suggested that the best time to administer post-test is after a month, 6 months, and a year of pre-test. Last thing that I did notice in the research article, the researchers obtain qualitative data through the use of survey utilizing a Likert scale that uses scaling responses in survey research. However, Likert scales are not designed to capture opinions, per se, but rather are designed to capture estimations of magnitude. This means that Likert scales do not produce qualitative data, irrespective of what the end-point labels may be. Data from Likert scales are quantitative. These scales assume equal intervals between points. Furthermore, they represent an order/rank, from less to more of something.
In conclusion, the paper is a good model in implementing a research that involves control and experimental groups, but there are lapses (as mentioned above) which would greatly affect the results of the study. Thus, these lapses must be corrected, enhanced, and improved as to the implementation of my study.