Effect of Hands-on Laboratory Experiment and Demonstration Teaching Techniques on Rwandan Secondary School Students’ Academic Performance in Solutions and Titration

Abstract

The main objective of this intervention study was to investigate the effect of three teaching approaches, namely the traditional teaching method (TTM), a teacher-based demonstration experiment (TBDE) and a student hands-on experiment (SHE), on students’ academic performance. A total number of 324 senior five students studying chemistry as one of the main subjects in their combinations were selected from four provinces and Kigali city in Rwanda. The data were collected using a chemistry achievement test comprising 30 multiple-choice questions. This test was administered before and after teaching intervention to measure the effect of the three teaching approaches on students’ academic performance of solutions and titration. The Kruskal–Wallis test indicated that both SHE and TBDE had a higher mean rank after the intervention than the TTM group. The post-hoc test showed a statistically significant difference in the mean score of TTM vs. TBDE, as well as TTM vs. SHE. However, there was no significant statistical difference between the SHE vs TBDE groups. The results indicate that providing laboratory experiments through SHE or TBDE approaches significantly improved students’ academic performance of solutions and titration. Chemistry teachers are advised to use laboratory experiments provided either through SHE or TBDE as an effective remedial tool that could improve students’ performance in solutions and titration.

Keywords:

• Chemistry achievement test
• student hands-on experiments
• traditional teaching method
• students’ performance
• teacher-based demonstration experiments

Acknowledgements

We thank the teachers and students who participated in the study. We also thank Thumah Mapulanga and Anthony Bwalya for their comments.