ABSTRACT
The aims of this study were to reveal the effects of problem based learning on metacognitive skills and academic achievement, to analyze the metacognitive skills and academic achievement according to gender, and to discuss the correlation between metacognitive skills and academic achievement profiles. Students’ metacognitive skills were measured with Metacognitive Activity Inventory (MCA-I) that was developed by Cooper and Urena (2008), while a chemistry achievement test was undertaken to measure the students’ academic performance. A quantitative method was adapted to examine the results. Parametric t-test and Pearson Correlation Coefficient were used for data analysis. As result of analyzing the data, it can be concluded that problem based learning contributed positively both on students’ metacognitive skills and students’ academic achievement. Furthermore, significant correlation at the level of 0.01 exposed the relationship between metacognitive skills and students’ achievement. According to gender, female students scored higher than males, both in MCA-I and the achievement test.
