Development and evaluation of a guided inquiry laboratory manual for high school chemistry

This study develops and evaluates a Guided Inquiry laboratory manual for high school chemistry.The One-group pretest-posttest design was used to evaluate the effectiveness of the developed laboratory manual. The samples for this study were two intact groups of third year students from the science and non-science oriented sections of Saint Mary\u27s University High School Department (SMUHS), Bayombong, Nueva Vizcaya.The research process involved the following stages: preparation, development, evaluation by experts, experimental stage, and final stage. The instruments used in this study were as follows: evaluation questionnaires for chemistry experts, evaluation questionnaires for students, Saint Mary\u27s University-Watson & Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal (SMU-WGCTA), and chemistry achievement test. The statistical treatment employed in this study were descriptive statistics, t-test for paired observation, and the Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA).The results of the study revealed the following: 1) laboratory experiments designed as a guided inquiry format are useful and relevant, comprehensive, have appropriate instructions and can generate students\u27 interests 2) Guided Inquiry experiments and the traditional verification experiments have comparable effects on the development of the critical thinking skills of students when used over similarly short duration of exposure or time 3) students exposed to Guided Inquiry experiments could score significantly higher in a chemistry achievement test compared with those exposed to the traditional verification experiments and 4) science oriented students exposed to the Guided Inquiry experiments could achieve higher score in a chemistry achievement test compared with non-science oriented students