Meta-cognitive Strategy and Secondary School Students’ Achievement and Retention in Chemistry

The study examined the effect of meta-cognitive strategy (KWL) and secondary school students’ academic achievement and retention in chemistry in Uyo metropolis in Akwa Ibom state, Nigeria. Two research questions were raised and two hypotheses formulated to guide the study. The design for the study was a pretest posttest quasi-experimental. Two out of fifteen public secondary schools in Uyo metropolis of Akwa Ibom state were randomly selected for the study. A sample of one hundred (100) SS11 students consisting of 47 boys and 57 girls from two intact classes were drawn from the selected schools. Two validated instruments tagged chemistry achievement test (CAT) and chemistry retention test (CRT) containing 25 items each were used to collect data. The reliability co-efficient of CAT and CRT were determined using test-retest method. The data obtained were analysed using Pearson Product Moment Correlation (PPMC) and the reliability coefficients of 0.81 for CAT and 0.77 for CRT were obtained respectively. Mean and standard deviation were used to answer research questions and analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) was used to test hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The findings showed a significant difference in achievement and retention scores of chemistry students taught alkanols using KWL and those taught with expository strategy. It is recommended that chemistry teachers use Know- What and Learn meta-cognitive strategy during instructional delivery to make teaching and learning more participatory, self monitoring and self evaluating so as deeper to understanding and retention of chemistry concepts. Keywords: Meta-cognitive strategy, Know- What and Learn, expository, chemistry Achievement, self monitoring, Retention DOI: 10.7176/CMR/11-3-04 Publication date:March 31st 201