Improving students’ mathematics achievements using classroom interventions

Abstract

Increasing retention and success rates, using innovative techniques, is one of the core objectives in community colleges. Several researches have shown that interventions strategies boost such rates in high and middle schools. The purpose of this study is to examine how classroom interventions impacts student’s mathematics achievements in a remedial mathematics course at a community college. This quantitative research used cluster sampling to obtain a sample of 44 students from two fundamental algebra sections in Fall 2018 semester at LaGuardia Community College, New York City, US. The instruments used in this study are the first and second attempts of two departmental exams and the final exam scores. After each departmental exam, students were divided into two groups, a basic and advance group, based on their performances on the exam. Each group had a 4-hour intervention session separately before they were given a second attempt for the departmental exam. The difference between the first and second attempt of departmental exam 1 and departmental exam 2 average scores were calculated to evaluate students’ improvements after the interventions. Correlations were performed to assess the strength of the relationship between each departmental exam and the final exam. The result of this quantitative research showed that the classroom interventions helped students improve their departmental exams scores. However, departmental exam 2 intervention had more positive impact on the final exam scores than departmental exam 1 intervention.

Keywords

• Intervention
• student achievements
• Concept understanding

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