The Effect of Reading Comprehension Skills on Mathematics and Science According to PISA Data

The aim of the study is to determine whether the reading comprehension skill has an effect on mathematics and science achievement, and which variables affect the success and to what extent. In line with this purpose, the sub-problems of the research were the student characteristics measured in the PISA student questionnaire, the important variables that predicted the students' science achievement in terms of reading comprehension and mathematics scores, and the important variables that predicted students' mathematics achievement in terms of student characteristics and reading comprehension scores measured in the PISA student questionnaire. Since the aim of the study was to determine the variables that are important in predicting PISA mathematics and science achievement in scales measuring students' affective characteristics and tests measuring achievement levels, the type of research was determined as a relational quantitative research design. The sample of the research consists of 6,890 students studying in 186 schools representing 12 regions in Turkey, selected by PISA in PISA 2018 application by stratified random sampling method from a population of 1.038.993 people from Turkey. In the research, the OECD database, which was opened for sharing in 2020, was used during the data collection phase. In the study, variables belonging to 2018 PISA data were used to predict mathematics and science achievement. The data were analyzed by data mining and quantitative data analysis methods. In the analysis of the data, SPSS Modeler and WEKA programs were used as a basis and in a systematic way, respectively. Excel and SPSS programs; SPSS Modeler and WEKA were used as utilities while transferring data and calculating some statistics. In the light of research findings, reading comprehension skill was determined as the most basic skill for science and mathematics success. In addition, mathematical literacy positively affects science achievement.