Effects of inquiry-based learning on students’ mathematics achievement and math anxiety

Abstract

This study was a classroom action research. The research objectives aimed to enhance students’ mathematics achievement by using inquiry-based learning and to investigate the effect of inquiry-based learning on levels of students’ math anxiety. The sample consisted of 31 Grade 12 students who enrolled in the first semester of the academic year 2019 at a secondary school in Bangkok Metropolis, Thailand. The research instruments consisted of eight lesson plans covering 12 learning periods on the topic of Limits and Continuity of Functions, pre-test, post-test, and math anxiety questionnaire. The results of this research indicated that the effectiveness concerning students’ achievement after being instructed had an Effectiveness Index (E.I.) of 0.7689 which means that the students’ learning achievement had been developed by 76.89% based on prior knowledge. In addition, the post-test scores were statistically significantly higher than pre-test scores at the .05 level. As for students’ opinions towards the instruction that affected their math anxiety level in learning mathematics, it was found that the students' opinions on teaching that affect the level of anxiety in mathematics learning were: “very high” (6.45%), “high” (25.81%), “low” (48.39%), and “very low” (19.35%)