Deczy Antha Sari

Universitas Negeri Surabaya

Eko Hariyono

Universitas Negeri Surabaya

DOI: https://doi.org/10.19184/jpf.v15i3.60003

ABSTRACT 

Understanding mechanical wave concepts remains difficult for many high school students because instruction is rarely connected to real natural phenomena. This study examined the implementation, learning outcomes, and student responses associated with a guided inquiry learning model integrated with earthquake phenomena on the topic of mechanical waves. A quantitative approach was employed using a quasi-experimental, non-equivalent control group pretest–posttest design, involving 32 eleventh-grade students in the experimental group and 31 students in the control group at a public senior high school in Jombang Regency, Indonesia. Data were collected through a learning implementation observation sheet, a 15-item multiple-choice cognitive achievement test, and a student response questionnaire, then analyzed using percentage analysis, the Shapiro–Wilk and Levene tests, an independent-samples t-test, normalized gain (N-Gain), and Cohen's d effect size. The results showed that the learning implementation reached a mean of 97.20%, categorized as very good. The experimental group obtained an N-Gain of 0.68 (medium category), higher than the control group's 0.56 (medium category). The independent-samples t-test on posttest scores yielded a significance value of 0.034 (p < 0.05), indicating a statistically significant difference in learning outcomes between groups, supported by a medium effect size (Cohen's d = 0.58). Student responses were very positive, with item-level approval ranging from 82.81% to 95.31%. These findings indicate that embedding the locally relevant context of earthquakes within a guided inquiry framework can be implemented effectively and can meaningfully improve high school students' cognitive achievement on mechanical waves, offering a contextualized instructional alternative for physics teachers in seismically active regions.