Impact of national senior certificate examination diagnostic report on learner performance in mathematics

The study sought to determine whether the use of the National Senior Certificate Examination Diagnostic Report (NSCEDR) in an intervention programme would improve the performance of learners in Mathematics. The study utilised a mixed method approach. An action research that employed a quasi-experiment, one group, pre-test and post-test research design was used. A total of 74 grade twelve learners, 46 girls and 28 boys, were selected and participated in an intervention programme for six weeks. Three NSCEDR documents, from 2014 to 2016, were used to determine the topics that were challenging to learners in Mathematics, as well as the errors and misconceptions made by learners in examinations. The topics that were challenging were identified together with their frequency in the three documents. The marks of the learners before and after the intervention programme were compared and analysed. The Statistical Package of Social Sciences (SPSS) and Excel were used to analyse the research data. The results of the study revealed that the use of the NSCEDR findings in the intervention programme improved the performance of the learners, while the impact was indifferent for boys and girls, and as well as for low performers and high performers. Trigonometry, Euclidean Geometry and Counting Principle were some of the most challenging topics in Grade 12 Mathematics that were identified from the NSCEDR. Based on these results, it was recommended that the NSCEDR should be readily available to all teachers to use, as their use in the classroom improved the performance of the learners.

Grantor dc:publisher.institution

University of Zululand

Year dc:date.issued

2017

Author dc:creator

• Chihambakwe, Thabani

• senior certificate examinations --diagnostic report --learner performance

Licence

• https://devspace.unizulu.ac.za/bitstreams/8ea297f1-edbe-4faf-8494-1696bb43513c/download