Effectiveness of inquiry based instruction on science process skills achievement in science and metacognition of higher secondary school students

Abstract

The study was conducted to find out the Effectiveness of Inquiry-Based Instruction on Science Process skills, Achievement in Science and Metacognition of Higher Secondary School Students for the study. In addition to these variables, effectiveness of InquiryBased Instruction on Attitude towards Science was also studied by the investigator. The sample consisted of 90 higher secondary school students. Experimental method was used for the study and the researcher decided to adopt a Quasi-Experimental design, namely Pre-test, Post-test Non-Equivalent Control group design. Self-constructed tool was used for assessing the Science Process Skills, Achievement in Science, and Attitude towards Science. Metacognitive Awareness Inventory by Schraw and Dennison was also used for data collection. Correlation analysis revealed that Science Process Skills, Achievement in Science, Attitude towards Science, and Metacognitionwere positively related. There was a significant difference in the Science Process Skills, Achievement in Science, and Attitude towards Science and Metacognitive Awarenessof students taught by Inquiry Based Instruction and Conventional method and the mean scores revealed that Inquiry Based Instruction enhanced the Science Process Skills, Achievement in Science, Attitude towards Science and Metacognitive Awarenessof higher secondary school students. Gender wise there is no significant difference in Achievement in Science of students in the Inquiry Based Instruction group. It was found that Girls of Inquiry Based Instruction group possessed better Classification, Communicating, and Collectionand Interpretation of data skills than boys, whereas boys had better Observation skill. The study also revealed that Boys of both Control and Experimental group had better Attitude towards Science than the girls. The study found that Girls of Experimental group had better Metacognitive Awareness, Knowledge of Cognition, and Debugging Strategies than the boys. Delayed Post-test score on Achievement in Science and Attitude