EFFECT OF PROBLEM SOLVING METHOD ON STUDENTS MATHEMATICS ACHIEVEMENT AND ATTITUDE IN KERSA SECONDARY SCHOOL OF EAST HARARGE ZONE OF OROMIA REGIONAL STATE

Abstract

The objective of this study was to evaluate the effects of problem solving method on students’ mathematics achievement and students’ attitude toward mathematics. The data were collected with Achievement Test and Questionnaire. The data was analyzed descriptively and inferentially by using SPSS version 20.0. During this study, problem solving method was applied to the experimental group and lecture method teaching to the control group. After the treatment posttest and questionnaire were used to see the effects of the treatment. A two-tailed t-test was used to analyze the data which revealed that both the experimental and control groups were almost similar in mathematics achievement and attitude toward mathematics at the beginning of the experiment. While the results of post-tests revealed that there was significant difference in the mean score of both experimental and control group. The results of the study indicated that mean score of the experimental group was higher than the control group. It was concluded that problem solving method was more effective on improved the students’ mathematics achievement and students’ attitude toward mathematics than lecture method. The study recommended that teachers may prefer problem solving method in teaching of mathematics.