Using differentiated instruction to improve SHS students’ performance of cell division

Abstract

This study used Differentiated Instructional to improve students‘ performance of cell division among Senior High School Form Three (SHS 3) students of the Delcam Senior High School in the Adentan Municipality of the Greater Accra Region of Ghana. Quasiexperimental research design was used. The sampling technique was census. The instrument for data collection was the tests (pre-test and pre-test). Student‘s census was taken of all science students in form three. A Pre-test (Student Knowledge on Mitosis Test) was conducted to identify students‘ misconceptions related to the subject. The researcher taught the students using differentiated instruction. A post-test was administered to the sample. The pre-test elicited several alternate concepts from the students. This was to prove that students of Delcam SHS have alternate concepts in cell division (mitosis). The means of the pre-test and post-test were compared using the paired t-test. The differentiated instruction used was able to improve the performance of Students at the intervention stage. The post-test (Student Assessment on Mitosis Test) had 80% pass rate whiles the pre-test had 5% pass rate. There was a significant difference between the post-test and pre-test scores [t= 11.906: p<0.05]. There was no significant difference between the scores of the male and female students in the post-test [t=1.4; P>0.05]. From the research, gender had no effect on differentiated instruction. The study concluded that differentiated instruction improves students‘ performance in cell division (mitosis). Since the findings of the study showed that students exposed to the differentiated instructional in cooperative learning settings performed better in such learning settings, students should be encouraged to develop social interaction in the use differentiated instruction. This implies that biology teachers should model their instructions to enforce student-student interaction in differentiated instruction class.