THE EFFECTIVENESS OF THE INQUIRY-BASED TEACHING APPROACH ON TECHNICAL AND VOCATIONAL STUDENTS’ MATHEMATICS ACHIEVEMENT IN GHANA

Abstract

The study investigated the effectiveness of the inquiry-based teaching approach on technical and vocational students’ mathematics achievement in Sekyere East District in Ghana. The research adopted a quantitative approach that employed quasi-experimental design. Purposive sampling technique was used to select 80 first-year students from Krobea Asante Technical and Vocational Institute for this study with 40 students each in the experimental and control groups. Data were collected using pre-test and post-test measurements with non-equivalent groups Statistical analysis using the independent sample t-test revealed that students instructed through the inquiry-based approach in the experimental group outperformed those taught via the conventional approach in the control group. Cohen d effect size of 1.13 was obtained indicating that the Inquiry-based teaching approach is more effective in teaching geometry course than the conventional approach. The study recommended among others that teachers in the pre-tertiary institutions should employ Inquiry-Based approach in teaching geometry and its related topics.