Effectiveness of Simulation-Based Activities vs. Traditional Interventions in Teaching Biology: A Meta-Analysis

Abstract

One of the emerging educational technologies is simulation-based activities.Numerous research has been conducted to compare virtual reality to various techniques of teaching anatomy, including structures, lectures, graphical representations, and mixed training.This meta-analysis was focused on the effectiveness of simulation-based activities in teaching biology vs. the traditional interventions in teaching biology. The scope was limited to interventions involving simulations in biology for High school and Senior High School students in STEM contexts. This systematic review showed that when compared with conventional or digital teaching methods, simulation-based activities can enhance the effectiveness of teaching and learning biology. Of all the 15 studies, five evaluated the satisfaction level as a secondary outcome, which shows that most students were more interested in using simulation-based activities to learn biology. Thus, simulation-based activities as an intervention could enhance the quality of teaching biology.Due to the lack of qualitative and descriptive data, the risk of bias for most studies wasuncertain. On the contrary, the researcher emphasized that the meta-analysis results are not concise due to the lack of standardized procedures and high heterogeneity of the studies and subgroups.