A Study on Attitude of Secondary Level Students Towards Mathematics in Tanahun District

Abstract

This study is mainly concerned with the attitudes of mathematic of secondary level students in Tanahun district. The collection of data for the study is done with the help of a list of questions entitled "A modified Fennema-Sherman Mathematics Attitudes Scale". The opinionnaire was distributed to 184 students of 14 schools: (7 from urban and 7 rural areas, among them 10from government and 4from private schools.) 'χ2- test' was applied to each item of a set of opinionnaire to find the opinion of boys and girls towards mathematics. The statistical tool 'z-test' was applied to compare the attitudes of boys and girls as well as the attitudes of rural and urban students towards mathematics. Both tests were applied at 0.05 'level of significant'. For the finalizing process, the study has been organized into five chapters. The first chapter deals with the introduction: background, significance, objectives limitations of the study, history of maths education, statement of problem, hypothesis and conceptual framework. The second chapter is review of literature conducted in this area. The third Chapter deals with the Methodology: design, sample, tools and population of the area of the study, procedures for data collection, scoring and analysis. The fourth one contains the results in the tabular form and its interpretation. The final chapter includes summary conclusion, major findings and recommendation. Finally Bibliography and Appendices are incorporated. On the basis of analysis and interpretation of the data, the following major findings were drawn: 1. The χ2-value of the all 48 statements is from 342.42 to 15.64 at the 0.05 level of significance which are greater than 9.488.So the secondary level students had positive attitude towards mathematics. 2. The average score and standard deviation of boys and girls attitude toward mathematics are 333.13, 343.44 and 42.64, 38.74 respectively. The z-value is-1.653 which is greater than tabulated value. So the secondary level boys and girls had similar attitude towards mathematics. 3. The average score and standard deviation of urban and rural student's attitude toward mathematics are 344.56, 330.39 and 41.38, 43.03 respectively. The z- value is 2.176 which is greater than the tabulated value 1.96. So the mean attitude scores of urban students are significantly different than that of rural students towards mathematics.