Incorporating Error Analysis Approach into the Teaching of Practical Chemistry in Senior Secondary Schools in Makurdi Nigeria: Any Effect on Achievement?

Abstract

This study focused on the effect of incorporating error analysis approach in teaching practical chemistry on students’ achievement in senior secondary (SS) school chemistry. The study was carried out in Makurdi Metropolis using SS2 chemistry students. Both purposive and simple random sampling techniques were employed to select the sample (N = 132) from the 28 government approved schools. Four intact classes were used and the members of these intact classes constituted the sample. Practical Chemistry Achievement Test (PCAT) was used for data collection. Using Spearman Rank Order, the reliability coefficient of PCAT was found to be 0.71. The data collected were analyzed using mean and standard deviation to answer the research questions while Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA) was used to test the hypotheses at the 0.05 level of significance. The findings reveal that the experimental group showed significant mean gain in achievement towards chemistry learning (P = 0.0001 < 0.05). On the basis of gender there was no significant difference in the achievement of both boys and girls in the experimental group (P = 0.775 > 0.05). Some of the recommendations among others are that chemistry teachers should be trained in the use incorporating error analysis approach as a teaching strategy and that chemistry teachers should be motivated not to restrict themselves to the subject contents only but teach practical along with identified errors also.