Why most students score bad grades in Mathematics: The Dossier

Mathematics as a subject is one of the subjects that performs poorly in the KCSE KNEC examinations. Consider the progress of mathematics in the table below since the year 2009 to 2013.

mathematics performance in the KCSE - KNEC examinations since 2009

The fifth column with the mean score is a clear evidence that mathematics has been performing poorly in over a decade and the results are even getting poorer with the best mean ever achieved as 29.46; this trend is worrying especially for a country aspiring to be a first world in the year 2030. Industrialization comes with science courses like engineering and we can't mold good engineers and doctors who are not doing fine in mathematics.

My Science Fair students (Everlyne Tete and Linet Wangari) did a research on why most students are performing poorly in mathematics and the results were astonishing. Twenty four students were asked to give opinions on why they performed poorly in the previous mathematics examinations and gave the following feedback (each student was allowed to choose utmost three options)

1. one student claimed the reason as insufficient resources
2. Twenty Four students identified failure to bad attitude
3. Two associated failure to bad influence from teachers
4. one said its because of unfriendly learning environment
5. Four pointed a finger to unending teacher's strikes
6. Four identified their failure to psychological effects
7. Fifteen associated to examinations fever
8. Two students pointed a finger on poor mathematics background
9. Four said less time is allocated to mathematics and
10. Seventeen were quick point a finger on unfriendly learning methods

The graph below represents a summary of what has been discussed above

graph showing how students are performing in kcse examinations in mathematics

From the above graph, we can deduce that most students don't pass in mathematics because they have the following factors:

1. bad attitude
2. unfriendly learning methods
3. examinations fever

Resolutions

When the respondents were asked on what would be done to improve their performance, they responded in the following way

1. Extensive revision was necessary
2. Teachers to assist them unlearn the knowledge which was a source of bad attitude
3. They thought they deserved to be applauded and motivated with any effort they show
   
4. Should be assisted to learn how to manage time well

Conclusions

This research could be used by teachers and other stakeholders in the mathematics departments to devise ways of assisting pupils to pursue this course with utter easiness. Scientific methods of learning should be applied if any meaningful gains are to be made. 
Also read:     General principles of Effective Teaching

Research Supervised and Compiled by Maurice Nyamoti A.