Enhancing Creativity, Storytelling, and Problem-Solving Abilities: Findings from Project-Based Learning (PBL) in Undergraduate Communication Students in South Korea

The purpose of this study is to investigate whether Project-Based Learning (PBL) method improves student learning outcomes such as (a) creativity, (b) storytelling and (c) problem-solving abilities among the undergraduate communication students in South Korea. In addition, this study examined the different effects between individual PBL and team PBL. Courses are designed for individual PBL class (n=35) and team PBL class (n=35). The results of the pretest and posttest analysis prove that PBL methods improve the imagination and the creative potential of students. It also has a positive effect on the storytelling. Regarding the problem-solving outcome, students in team PBL have more benefits than students working individually. In addition, students in individual PBL class do not have any positive effect with problem-solving abilities. The analysis indicates that PBL has positive effects on creativity and storytelling, and there is an interactive effect between PBL effect (pretest vs. posttest) and PBL type (individual vs. group-project) in problem-solving. It is noteworthy that individual PBL and team PBL demonstrate different learning outcomes in problem-solving abilities. Future research needs to address the long-term effect of PBL methods.