The effects of project based learning method supported by multiple intelligences theory on academic achievement, attitudes towards social studies and retention

The primary purpose of this study was to find out whether there are significant differences in terms of attitudes towards the social studies course, academic achievement and retention between the experimental group in which the project based learning method supported by multiple intelligences theory (MIT) applied in the fourth grade social administered and the control group in which the traditional method based on the teaching of whole class instruction was administered.The study was designed on the experimental group with pre-test and post-test control groups. The study was conducted in a state public elementary school the district of Ceyhan-ADANA in the fall semester of 2007-2008 academic years. The application was carried on the 50 fourth-grade students attending two classes. The study was conducted in one experimental and one control group in different terms and lasted for eight weeks. The courses were done on the basis of schemes project based learning method supported by multiple intelligences theory in the experimental group. As for the control group the courses were done through the course plans prepared according to 2005-2006 social studies curriculum. While the courses were tought by the researcher in the experimental group, they were tought by the class teacher in the control group. ?Social Studies Attitude Scale? and ?Social Studies Achievement Test? were administered as pre-test and post-test to both the experimental and control groups. Before the beginning of the experimental study, ?Teele Inventory for Multiple Intelligences? was utilized to all of the participants. In the study covariance analysis was conducted on the data obtained from the achievement test and attitude scale. The level of significance was P<.05.The results obtained at the end of the study indicated that while there was a significant difference in favour of the experimental group in terms of the post-test score between the experimental group and control group, no significant difference was observed on the retention.Keyword: Multiple intelligences theory, project based learning, social studies