| dc.description.abstract | The purpose of this research project is to determine the impact of instructional materials
on academic achievement in Public Primary Schools in Siaya County when compared to
only abstract mathematics symbols. The project was based on four objectives including;
to establish the impact of concrete materials on achievement in measurement involving
money, to establish the impact of Geo board on achievement in Geometry, to determine
the impact of Algebra tiles on achievement in Algebra and to determine the impact of
place value blocks on achievement in mathematics number operations. The study adopted
experimental design involving pre test, post test of treatment and control groups. The
study was conducted in public primary schools in Siaya County. The target population
was 20564 Children and 696 standard four teachers and sample size comprised of 392
children and 8 teachers of mathematics. The findings from the research project indicated
that teachers have undergone an education system that had enlightened them on need to
know when, why and how to use manipulative effectively in the classroom as well as
opportunities to observe; first-hand impact of allowing learning through exploration with
concrete objects. According to findings, it can be seen that the control group of schools
had mean and standard deviation of 52.70and 13.57, respectively, while the experimental
group of schools had a mean and standard deviation of 74.30and 8.74, respectively. The
difference in performance of children in control group of schools and those in
experimental group of schools was found to be statistically significant (t (8) = -5.482, p =
.004, two tailed). This suggests that children who are taught mathematics using
instructional materials perform better than those who are only taught mathematics using
abstract mathematics symbols only. The difference in performance is due to interventions
(treatment) done to the experimental group of schools. Instructional material had more
impact in achievement in measurement involving money. Further findings show that
children in control group scored higher marks when they used place value blocks than
children in experimental group where instructional materials were applied. Geo board as
an instructional material had big impact on geometry achievement as compared to only
mathematical symbols in learning mathematics. Algebra tiles on achievement in Algebra
as a concept in mathematics had greatest impact compared to only mathematical symbols.
These findings show that children in experimental group scored higher marks than
children in control group where instructional materials were not applied. Study
recommends that since children taught mathematics using instructional materials perform
better than those who are taught mathematics using abstract mathematics symbols only,
they should be taught by use of instructional materials for better performance in
mathematics. In study where impact of place value blocks in achieving basic operations
on numbers in mathematics, Children in control group scored higher marks than children
in experimental group where instructional materials were applied. Study recommends
that all stake holders involved in the management of mathematics performance to rethink
the way forward. Government and ministry of education need to encourage elementary
teachers to use manipulative to help teach mathematics thereby positively affecting
student learning. Incorporating manipulative into mathematics lessons in meaningful
ways helps students grasp concepts with greater ease, making teaching most effective. | en_US |
