Effects of practical activity method on science practical process skills of senior high school students

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to assess physics students’ practical science process skills. In this study, practical action research was adopted as the research design that guided the study. In this study, the target population comprised all general science students studying physics at Apam Senior High School in the Central Region, Ghana. The study involved a total of 45 Senior High School Form Two physics students in Apam Senior High School in the central region of Ghana. The research instruments used to collect data for this study was a questionnaire and teaching intervention. Pre intervention and post-intervention practical tests were designed to determine students’ level of acquisition of science process skills before and after the intervention. This study also employed a questionnaire to gather additional information from the students on the impact of the intervention. Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 21 was used in analysing pre-test scores, post-test scores obtained from pre-intervention and post-intervention respectively. Data collected from the questionnaire was also analysed using SPSS. It was found that a significant number of students (about 40%) were unable to accurately measure angles of incidence (i) and angles of reflection (r) using the protractor and about 60% were able to measure. Again, the study revealed that a significant percentage of the students lack sufficient skill of presenting data. Specifically, 17(37.8%) of the students could not correctly plot points on a graph and majority of the students could not compute the slope of a graph. The positive impact of the intervention was attributed to the teaching method (demonstration by the researcher and team work among students) employed. Based on the findings, it was recommended that Science practical process skills such as measuring, making inferences, data presentation and interpretation should be taught in the physics classroom. This will enhance science students’ efficiency in understanding science through experimentation. Again, Apam senior high school physics teachers should teach science practical process skills via demonstrations and also allow for student-students interactive learning through team work for improvement of students’ performance in physics.