Effects of Technology-Integrated Brain-Friendly Teaching on Retention and Understanding in Photosynthesis and Cellular Respiration

Biology has been viewed as one of the focus subject areas being taught in the K to 12 Enhanced Basic Education Curriculum in the Philippines. However, in recent years of implementation students still show low academic achievement in this course. Various studies have revealed that knowledge retention and conceptual understanding, among others, are one of the most influential factors in the process of learning biology. To address this concern, this study used the 7R's of brain-friendly teaching which are Reach, Reflect, Recode, Reinforce, Rehearse, Review and Retrieve together with the integration of Google Classroom and Plickers as in a blended learning class in biology that focused on the topics of photosynthesis and cellular respiration. The integration of technology with techniques of brain-friendly teaching enabled the students to maximize their brains' natural ability to learn by having a stress-free environment, immersed learning experience in the concept of the topics in biology, and the process of applying their learning with immediate and motivational feedback. The researcher used short-term memory (STM) test and knowledge retention ability (KRA) test in determining knowledge retention while a pre-test and post-test were conducted to determine the change in the conceptual understanding of photosynthesis and cellular respiration after the implementation of the study. The scores of the STM and KRA test were analyzed using Pearson r correlation while the pre-test and post-test were analyzed by finding the learning gain. The correlation coefficients between the short-term memory test and knowledge retention ability test in the topic of photosynthesis (r= 0.74) and cellular respiration (r= 0.64) are both high which confirm that the implementation formed long-term memory from short-term memory. Also, the scores between the pre-test and post-test indicate a learning gain in photosynthesis (<g>= 1.42) and in cellular respiration (<g>= 1.84) both categorized as high learning gain which confirm that the use of technology integration and 7R's of brain-friendly teaching in a biology classroom increased the conceptual understanding of students in both topics of the implementation.