Effects of the Natural Product Mini Project Laboratory on the Students Conceptual Understanding

Abstract

This research aims to examine an application of the natural product mini project laboratory in order to improve the students’ conceptual understanding. This research was carried out by using quasi-experimental methods. Participants consisted of 31 students of chemistry education department (experimental class) and 28 students of chemistry department (control class) at 6th semester academic year 2012/2013 from one of state university in the West Nusa Tenggara, Indonesia. Experimental class used natural product mini project laboratory model (NP-MPLM) and control class used verification laboratory model. Research results showed that students used the natural product mini project laboratory more conceptual understanding than the students used verification laboratory. The average N-gain of conceptual understanding for experiment class was 0.56 while for the control class was 0.34. The highest N-gain in the experimental class was 0.73 for UV spectroscopy concept while the smallest N-Gain was 0.34 for thin layer chromatography concept. Before the application of the natural product laboratory mini project, the highest percentage of misconception in the experimental class occurred in metabolites category (44.09%) and the highest percentage of do not know the concept occurred in UV spectroscopy (59.68%). After the application of the natural product mini project laboratory, the highest percentage of misconceptions occurred in separation of chemical components (35.48%) and the highest percentage of do not know the concept occurred in NMR spectroscopy (29.03%).