PROCEEDINGS JOURNAL OF EDUCATION, PSYCHOLOGY AND SOCIAL SCIENCE RESEARCH

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1 PROCEEDINGS JOURNAL OF EDUCATION, PSYCHOLOGY AND SOCIAL SCIENCE RESEARCH journaldirect.com Presented in 2 nd International Conference in Education, Psychology, and Social Science (ICEPSS) International Research Enthusiast Society Inc. (IRES Inc.) May 22-23, 2015 Open Access Learning Styles And Mathematics Performance Of Grade Eight Students In Los Baños Integrated School, S.Y Joydy-Lenn L. Camposano 1, Ariane M. Villanueva 2, Alberto D. Yazon 3 1,2 BSEd IV-A Math 3 Thesis Adviser & Instructor III College of Teacher Education Laguna State Polytechnic University Los Baños Campus, Los Baños, Laguna Abstract This research aimed to determine the relationship between students learning styles of grade eight students and their mathematics performance during the 1st quarter in Los Baños Integrated School, Los Baños, Laguna. The instrument used in this study is the Learning Style inventory questionnaire adapted from Dr. John Golden, a Michigan math professor and proprietor of the MathHombre blog and based from the learning styles of Harvey Silver. The questionnaire is divided into two parts: the first part is the respondent s profile which consists of name and sex then the second part is the items which consist of 10 items for each learning style: Mastery, Interpersonal, Understanding and Self-expressive respectively. The instrument, learning style inventory questionnaire, was administered to 187 randomly selected respondents. Male respondents are greater than the female respondents having 95 and 92 respondents respectively. They are chosen through draw-lots or fishbowl technique. The data gathered from the questionnaires are analyzed and interpreted using descriptive statistics such as frequency count and percentage distribution and inferential statistics including Chi-square test (non-parametric) to determine the relationship between the independent and dependent variables. The students who belong to mastery learning style consist of 53 or 28.34% is the highest learning style of all the respondents. Under the level of performance in mathematics, the dominant level is the developing level in which the student at this level possesses the minimum knowledge and skills and core understandings, but needs help throughout the performance of authentic tasks. A chi-square test was utilized to analyze if there is a significant relationship between respondent s learning styles and level of performance in mathematics. The study revealed that there is no significant relationship between the variables, the degree of freedom is 16 computed from the formula, the Computed X2 value is and the tabular X2 value at.05 level of significance is Therefore, the hypothesis stating that there is no significant relationship between Grade eight students learning styles and their mathematics performance is accepted. Similar studies need to be conducted to further measure the associations of learning styles and students mathematical performance of other variables which were not included in this study. Moreover, conduct seminars and trainings for students to enhance students learning styles towards mathematics. Keywords: Learning Style Mathematics Performance Joydy-Lenn L. Camposano*, Ariane M. Villanueva, Alberto D. Yazon [email protected] *Corresponding Author

2 Introduction In the Philippines, teachers commonly observed that students level of achievements are getting deteriorated especially in Mathematics, Science and English and in other fields of studies. It was actually observed that in a class of 50 students, only twenty-five percent of them have very satisfactory achievement and thirty percent are only satisfactory. This observation was based on the actual performance of secondary students who came from remote schools between the years 2004 to present (Carbonel, 2013 Vol. 2). Learning takes place in several ways such as learning styles, experiences and trainings. Learning styles has been a great consideration among educators in finding the solutions in deterioration of academic performance. Learning means something different to everyone. As learners, they get excited about different things, they prefer to learn and be assessed in different ways, and they are comfortable with different kinds of thinking. In other words, they all have different styles of learning (Silver, 2009). Carl Gustav Jung, one of the founding fathers of modern psychology, discovered that the way which learners process and assess information tend to be developed into certain types of personality. After several years, Briggs and Myers expanded it as well as other educational researchers across the globe and put learning styles in the classrooms. Learning style is the way individuals begin to concentrate on, process, internalize and retain new and difficult information (Dunn, 2000). Students learn in a society of ways, and their ability to attain this information also varies (Carbonel, 2013 Vol. 2). The distinction of the individuality of students can be illustrated by the diversity of their test scores are comparable but their experiences varied (Kopsovich, 2001). Each learner has his own uniqueness and possesses a certain type of knowledge. Each learner has his own way to process information and carries personal experiences which are relevant to his learning. As a result, learner develops learning styles that can be enhanced and emphasized a particular learning ability which is different from the others and will become a factor of their performance mainly in Mathematics arena. Out of their work, Harvey Silver, Ed Thomas, and Matthew Perini identified their four mathematical learning styles. Mastery learners want to learn practical information and set procedures; Interpersonal learners want to learn math through dialogue, collaboration, and cooperative learning; Understanding learners want to understand why the math they learn works; and Self-Expressive learners want to use their imagination to explore mathematical ideas (Silver, Thomas, and Perini 2003). Align with this, evaluation of learners learning styles is the focal point and motivations of this study particularly their academic strengths and performance most especially in the field of mathematics. This study aimed to determine the relationship between learning styles of grade eight students and their mathematics performance during the 1 st quarter in Los Baños Integrated School S.Y Specifically, the researchers wanted to know the learning styles of the student-respondents and their respective mathematics performance and if these have relationship with each other. This study sought to answer the following questions: 1. What is the sex distribution of the Grade eight students in Los Baños Integrated School? 2. What are the learning styles of the Grade eight students in Los Baños Integrated School? 3. What are the mathematics performance of Grade eight students with the following learning styles: Mastery; Interpersonal; Understanding; and Self-expressive 4. Is there a significant relationship between Grade eight students learning styles and their mathematics performance? 109

3 Materials and Methods This study employed the descriptive-correlational research design. The respondents of this study were the 187 grade eight students of Los Baños Integrated School S.Y who were randomly chosen using multistage sampling technique. The main instrument used in this study was the Learning Style inventory questionnaire adapted from Dr. John Golden, a Michigan math professor and proprietor of the MathHombre blog and based from the learning styles of Harvey Silver. The questionnaire is divided into two parts: the first part is the respondent s profile which consists of name and sex then the second part is the items which consist of 10 items for each learning style: Mastery, Interpersonal, Understanding and Self-expressive respectively. This questionnaire is subjected to validation and approval of the expert (construct/content validity and reliability).the researchers gathered the grade eight student-respondents first quarter grades in mathematics during the S.Y This study used summation in determining the learning style of a student. There were 10 items in each learning style and the points in each item were summed up to get the total points for that particular learning style. This was also being done to the other learning styles. Upon obtaining the total points of each learning style, the highest total of points among the four was the students preferred learning style. The grade classifications used in this were based on the Grading System of k-12 Program of the Department of Education. Frequency counts, percentage, mean, standard deviation, Chi-square test and Pearson r were used as statistical tools to treat the gathered data. Results and Discussion Table 1 shows the frequency and percentage distribution of the student-respondents. Table 1. Frequency and Percentage Distributions of Student-Respondents Section Male Female Sample size F % f % Lucena Tayabas Lipa Tanauan Sta. Rosa Calamba San Pablo Dasmariñas TOTAL % % 187 Based on the results in Table 1, the 187 student-respondents were proportionally represented by eight sections of Grade 8 students. There are 23 students each in Lucena, Tanauan, and San Pablo. Tayabas and Lipa contained 25 students each. Sta. Rosa and Calamba have 21 students each while Dasmariñas has 26 student-respondents. Table 2 presents the frequency and percentage distributions of student-respondents learning styles. Table 2. Frequency and Percentage Distribution of Respondents Learning Styles Learning Style f % Mastery Interpersonal Understanding Self-Expressive Multi-Learning Styles Total % The students who belong to mastery learning style consist of 53 or 28.34%, interpersonal 26 or 13.9%, understanding 43 or 22.99%, self-expressive 41 or 21.93%, and for multi-learning styles 24 or 12.83% with a total of 187 respondents. 110

4 Table 3 describes the frequency distributions of the respondent s level of mathematics performance according to their learning style. Table 3. Frequency Distributions of the Respondent s Level of Performance According to their Learning Style Learning Styles Level of Performance B D AP P A Total Mastery Interpersonal Understanding Self-Expressive Multi-Learning Styles Total There are five (5) learners who belong to mastery learning style considered as beginning, 18 learners as developing, 15 learners as approaching proficiency, 11 learners as proficient, and 4 learners as advance proficient. For interpersonal learning style, there are 2 learners considered as beginning, 11 learners as developing, 7 learners as approaching proficiency, 5 learners as proficient, and 1 learner as advance proficient. For understanding learning style, there are 8 learners considered as beginning, 18 learners as developing, 8 learners as approaching proficiency, 7 learners as proficient, and 2 learners as advance proficient. For selfexpressive learning style, there are 5 learners considered as beginning, 18 learners as developing, 12 learners as approaching proficiency, 3 learners as proficient, and 3 learners as advance proficient. For those who have multilearning styles, none of them are considered as beginning but there are 6 learners considered as developing, 7 learners as approaching proficiency, 7 learners as proficient, and 4 learners as advance proficient. This means that the dominant learning style is Mastery because it has a total of 53 learners and the dominant mathematics performance is Developing which consists of 71 learners. Table 4 shows the chi-square analysis on the relationship between respondent s learning styles and level of performance in mathematics. Table 4. Chi-Square Analysis on the Relationship Between Respondent s Learning Styles and Level of Performance in Mathematics Variables Df Computed Tabular Decision Remarks X 2 value X Learning Styles Level of Performance in Mathematics Accept null hypothesis Not significant The computed X 2 value is and the tabular X 2 value at.05 level of significance with 16 as the degree of freedom is Since the computed X 2 - value is less than the tabular X 2 value, the null hypothesis on this study is accepted. Therefore, there is no significant relationship between students learning styles and their mathematics performance. Summary Conclusion and Recommendation Learning styles has been a great consideration among educators in finding the solutions in deterioration of academic performances especially in the field of mathematics. This study has the following objectives: to know the learning styles of the students and their respective mathematics performance and to determine if there exist a relationship between students learning styles and their mathematics performance. This research relied on the four learning styles of Dr. Harvey Silver and colleagues namely: Mastery, Interpersonal, Understanding, and selfexpressive learning styles. The instrument, learning style inventory questionnaire, was administered to 187 randomly selected respondents. This also showed that male respondents are greater that female ones. They are chosen through draw-lots or fishbowl technique. 111

5 As for the data analysis, descriptive statistics portrayed through frequency counts, percentage and inferential statistics was also used and conducted to see whether students learning styles has a significant relationship with their mathematics performance. The students who belong to mastery learning style consist of 53 or 28.34% is the highest learning style of all the respondents. Under the level of performance in mathematics, the dominant level is the developing level in which the student at this level possesses the minimum knowledge and skills and core understandings, but needs help throughout the performance of authentic tasks. Through chi-square analysis, the relationship between respondent s learning styles and level of performance in mathematics is determined. The degree of freedom is 16 computed from the formula, the Computed X 2 value is and the Tabular X 2 value at.05 level of significance is Conclusion Therefore, the null hypothesis is therefore accepted because it revealed that there is no significant relationship between learning styles and mathematics performance. Recommendations Based from the study, the following are recommended by the researchers: 1. The teachers must be aware of the learning styles of their students in order to have an effective teaching strategy. 2. Students must be aware of their learning styles so that they may be used it to enhance their learning capabilities in mathematics. 3. Teaching strategies of the teacher must be matched with the learning styles of the students. 4. For future researchers, they should study about the relationship of teaching strategies to learning styles of the students. References: Electronic resources Published thesis Kopsovich, R. D.(2001, August). A study of correlations between learning styles of Students and their mathematics scores on the Texas assessment of academic skills test. Retrieved July 11, 2014 from Carbonel, L. (2013, August). Learning styles, study habits, and academic performance of college students at Kalinga-Apayao State College, Philippines, Volume 2 no. 8. Retrieved July 11, 2014, from aapayao_state_college_philippines_loneza_gas-ib_carbonel_introduction Günes,C. (2004, September). Learning style preferences of preparatory school Students at Gazi University. Retrieved July 10, 2014 from Al-Balhan, E. (2007, Volume 16). Learning Styles in Relation to Academic Performance in Middle School Mathematics. Retrieved July 11, 2014, from Montemayor, et.al. (2009, June). Learning Styles of high and low academic achieving freshman teacher education students: an application of the Dunn and Dunn s learning style. Retrieved July 11, 2014, from /documents/learning_styles_of_high_and Low Academic_Achieving_Freshman_ pdf Joaquin,et.al. (2008, December). Goal modification, learning styles, and achievement in mathematics. Retrieved July 11, 2014, from Online Journals Cliffnotes Psychology. (n.d.). Descriptive-correlational research.retrieved July 28, 2014, from SAGE publication. (n.d.). Retrieved July 28, 2014, from sagepub.com/research_methods.sp Silver,et.al. (n.d.)the thoughtful classroom: making students as important as standards. Retrieved July 28, 2014, from /PD/newhorizons/ strategies/topics/assessment%20alternatives/silver.htm Learning-theories.com. (n.d.) Retrieved July 28, 2014, from 112

6 About education.(n.d.). Carl Jung. Retrieved July 28, 2014, from Unpublished thesis Molato, J. (2014, April). Learning styles, Achievement and attitude towards mathematics among fourth year students of Balibago National High Schoolc city of Sta. Rosa, Laguna. Tubal, L. (2014, April). Correlation between learning styles and mean percentage scores (MPS) in the national achievement test in mathematics of grade seven students in public secondary schools in the distinct of Los Baños Book Corpus, B. & Salandanan, G. (2013). Principles of Teaching I. Quezon City: Lorimar Publishing, INC. Website 113