An investigation into the relationship between what learners find relevant and how they perform in the grade 11 science curriculum
Date
2009-04-02T07:29:06Z
Authors
Patel, Firoza
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Abstract
Recent efforts in science education have focused on making the curriculum more
relevant. Many discourses maintain that relevance improves the teaching and
learning of science.
This study attempted to identify a relationship between content that learners thought
was relevant to them and how they actually performed in the examination. An
evaluation was also done to determine whether there was a gender difference in
choices regarding relevant content, and whether gender differences existed in the
performances of learners in the year-end examination. The study involved forty-six
learners from a low socio-economic school. Data from questionnaires and
examination scripts were statistically analysed to determine if there was any
correlation between relevance and performance.
Results showed firstly that the most relevant topics were equation of motion and
inorganic chemistry, with vectors being least relevant; secondly that there was no
correlation between what learners regarded as relevant and how they actually
performed in relation to content they identified as relevant; thirdly that there was no
gender difference in performance in physical science, with regard to the year-end
examination and the trend of boys favoring physics and girls preferring chemistry identified in other research, was shown to be true for these learners as well.
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Keywords
learners, relevant, gr 11 science, curriculum