Measuring Creative Thinking Skills of Senior High School Male and Female Students in Physics (CTSP) Using the IRT-based PhysTCreTS

Abstract

The study is aimed at (1) describing students’ CTSP, (2) comparing CTSP between male and female students, (3) identifying the highest and lowest sub-aspects of students’ CTSP. The research subjects were 534 students of the State Senior High School in Bantul Regency, obtained by a stratified random sampling technique. The testing instrument was the IRT-based PhysTCreTS and data were analysed using the Partial Credit Model (PCM) IRT technique. Findings show that: (1) The highest percentage of students’ CTSP lies in the “medium” category (48%), while the “high” and “very high” categories amount to 23%; (2) The CTSP of male students have a higher percentage than those of the female students but, in term of the means, male students’ abilities are lower; and (3) There are differences in the CTSP sub-aspects between male students and female students. For the high category, male students are dominant on the sub-aspects planning, expressing, and formulating while female students are dominant in planning, formulating, and expressing. For the low category, male students are dominant in finding alternatives, criticizing, and testing while female students are dominant in finding alternatives, developing, and testing. The result can be used as a ground base to enhance students' creative thinking by giving special treatment to sub-aspects which fall into the low category of the creative thinking abilities of male and female students.