Innovative Teaching Strategy: A Solution to Enhance Critical Thinking and Problem-Solving Skills

Abstract

This study aims to check the impact of innovative teaching approaches on students’ critical thinking and problem-solving abilities within the General Foundation Programme Level 3 (GFP-F3). As the current job market seeks graduates who can think analytically and handle complex challenges, this study follows an experimental design with students grouped in pretest–posttest control groups to compare innovative teaching approaches with traditional methods. A total of 190 students were involved in the study. Of these, 95 students were placed in the experimental group, where they engaged in real-world examples, tasks with complexity, and flipped classroom activities. The remaining 95 students were grouped to design the control group and continued with conventional lecture-based instruction. Standardized assessment tools were administered before and after a six-week intervention period to evaluate skill development. The data collected were analyzed statistically with the support of independent-samples t-tests, gain score analysis, confidence intervals, and effect size calculations. The results showed a statistically significant advantage for the experimental group in both targeted skill areas, proving that innovative teaching methods resulted in significant gains in higher-order thinking skills. Overall, the study emphasis that integrating quality-centric innovation into GFP instruction can significantly strengthen foundation-level education and better equip students to meet the academic and professional challenges of modern society.