Department of Chemistry

URI for this collectionhttps://rps.wku.edu.et/handle/987654321/2335

Department of Chemistry

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    DENTIFYING AND MINIMIZING STUDENTS’ MISCONCEPTIONS IN CHEMICAL BONDING: THE CASE OF GRADE 9 STUDENTS IN KUTERE SECONDARY SCHOOL, SILTE ZONE, CENTRAL ETHIOPIA, ETHIOPIATHE CASE OF GRADE 9 STUDENTS IN KUTERE SECONDARY SCHOOL
    (Wolkite University, 2024-09-01) HASSEN MAHMUD ALI
    Children do not come to school as a “tabula rasa, but rather with knowledge gained from different sources and through daily life. These different sources can help or hinder learning. This situation is said to be misconception. The main purpose of this study was to identify and minimize students’ misconceptions about chemical bonding. The study was carried out in Kutere Secondary School in Silte Zone, Central Ethiopia with special reference to grade 9 students’ focus. Descriptive survey, especially a case study was employed to address the problem. To conduct this study 72 students were selected through stratified sampling technique from the total population of 360 students. To achieve the objectives of the study employed data gathering tools were the conceptual understanding tests (pre-and post-test) in the chemical bonding topic. Each question in the conceptual understanding test was designed to previous students’ knowledge and understanding about chemical bonding. All data collected were analyzed quantitatively. The study described the causes for these misconceptions. These were students’ personal experience, inappropriate use of laboratory, misinformation, inattentiveness, selective attention, and unevaluated text books. Replacing those misconceptions with scientifically accepted conceptual views is necessary and efforts should be made to create awareness continuously for students, teachers, school principals and educational experts. Conducting training and different workshop with those concerned bodies is more advisable to increase the understanding and to avoid (minimize) misconceptions in chemical bonding. Thus, to improve the situation, it is recommended that every educator should be aware of students background, daily life experience, pre conceptions before providing lessons on chemistry teachers should spend more time to produce more conceptual talk about the topic to bring conceptual understanding, different instructional methods should be applied to support conceptual understanding of chemical bonding.
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    IMPACT OF CLASS SIZE ON ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT IN CHEMISTRY AT PUBLIC SECONDARY SCHOOLS OF SEBETA AWAS WOREDA, OROMIA REGION
    (Wolkite University, 2024-01-01) FIKADU EJETA TUFA
    This study assessed the impact of class size on academic achievement of chemistry in secondary schools in Sebeta Awas Woreda. The study used descriptive survey research design whereby both qualitative and quantitative approaches were the basis of data collection and data analysis. A sample of three public secondary schools was selected using the simple random sampling technique. The population of the study comprised all the eight chemistry teachers, three principals, one vice principal, one supervisor and one hundred sixty-two students. Data was collected using questionnaire, interview, observation and document review and the analysis of the questions was done using descriptive statistics, frequency, percent, mean and standard deviation. The research questionnaires were validated by advisor, supervisor and two senior science teachers in secondary schools of Tefki and Awash Melka and the pilot-test method was used to ascertain its reliability with coefficients of 0.92 for the teachers’ questionnaires and 0.98 for the students’ questionnaires. The findings revealed that class size had negative impact on academic achievement in chemistry. It was also observed that class size has psychological and social impact on students’ academic achievement and negatively influence teacher’s quality of work and assessment, whereas, they are improved by small class size. It was recommended, among other suggestion, that governments should prioritize the construction of more building of additional classrooms and the employment of more teachers to provide solution to the problem of high students-teachers ratios. The students-teacher ratio should be 45:1 as suggested by National Policy on Education as against 70-112 and above as discovered from the study. As a long-term measure, the government should increase budget allocation to improve schools’ infrastructural facilities.