EFFECTS OF STUDENTS’ LANGUAGE INTERPRETATION ON PERFORMANCE IN MATHEMATICS IN SELECTED SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN NAKURU NORTH SUB-COUNTY KENYA

Abstract

This study was set to investigate the effect of students’ language interpretation on performance in mathematics. Performance in Mathematics as demonstrated by the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education results has remained deprived for years. Numerous interventions have been set into place to address this low students’ performance in Mathematics in Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education. The Ministry of Education has attempted to boost mathematics teaching in most schools by introducing projects that includes Strengthening Mathematics and Sciences in Secondary Education, in order to boost performance. However, the students’ low performance in Mathematics in Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education persists. This prompted the researcher to investigate the effect of students’ language interpretation on performance in mathematics. The study was directed by the following four objectives; Firstly was to investigate how students’ interpretation of language influenced their performance in mathematics; Secondly was to investigate how representation of word problems in mathematics contributed to poor performance in mathematics; Thirdly was to investigate how students’ analysis of mathematical vocabulary influenced performance in mathematics and finally was to investigate if students ‘manipulation of mathematics problems influenced their performance. The origin for the study was the constructivist theory by J. Bruner which recommends for teaching learners to build their meanings of mathematical terminologies. The study used Quasi-experimental design. This design was suitable because the students who participated in the study could only be found in intact classes. The target population consisted of all Form 3 students in Nakuru North Sub-County which had a target population of 1926 students in the 35 public schools. Sixteen schools with a population of 731 students formed a sample. Written tests and questionnaire were applied as the data collection instruments. The data was analyzed by use of Statistical Package for Social Sciences version 22. The results indicate that the students performed significantly better after they were taught mathematics’ vocabularies than before (p=0.000). This study concluded that good performance in mathematics is greatly related to students’ understanding of mathematical vocabularies. The findings of this study are beneficial to Mathematics teachers, teacher educators, textbook writers as well as the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development. The study recommends that mathematics teachers should put more emphasize on definition of mathematical language while presenting content to learners. Students’ Mathematics textbooks should have well defined vocabularies to ensure that the students understand them.