Available Online: 27 June 2020
Author/s:
Naval, Dorothy*
Institute of Teaching and Learning, Philippine Normal University, Philippines (naval.dj@pnu.edu.ph)
Abstract:
Many students find physics as a difficult subject which results in low achievement in all levels of education. To augment this issue, instructors look for ways on how to motivate and engage students in their course to explore physics concepts and science skills. The main purpose of the study was to determine the effects of practical work on students’ performance and motivation in physics. The motivation of students to learn physics in college course was examined by responding to the Physics Motivation Questionnaire II (PMQ II) by Glynn (2011), 5-Likert scale with 25 items, and reliability of 0.92 assessed by Cronbach’s alpha. Their performance in physics course was determined by pretest-posttest means using t-test. The result of the study showed that practical work promotes enjoyment, learning, and motivation to the non-physics major students. Males are most motivated intrinsically while females are highly career motivated. Moreover, students perform better in the posttest as revealed by their mean achievement scores. This approach was considered effective since there was an improvement in the students’ performance in terms of knowledge acquisition.
Keywords: practical work; introductory physics; motivation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.5861/ijrse.2020.5801
Cite this article:
Naval, D. (2020). Practical work: Its effects on performance and motivation of non-physics major students. International Journal of Research Studies in Education, 9(1), 99-108. https://doi.org/10.5861/ijrse.2020.5801
*Corresponding Author