Analysis of student performance in chemistry calculations in the SEC May 2016 examination

Abstract

This research was conducted to analyse the errors Maltese chemistry students made when performing calculations in the May 2016 Paper I of the Secondary Education Certificate examination. In order to do so, 100 Paper I scripts were analysed. Fifty of these scripts belonged to candidates who scored over 80 marks in the examination and these were deemed to be the high-achieving group while the other 50 scripts were obtained for students who scored between 40 and 60 marks and these were deemed to be the low-achieving group. Responses to two questions containing calculations were analysed using item and error analysis. The item analysis included calculating the discriminating power and facility index for all the questions, while the error analysis focused on the analysis of errors within different categories according to the nature of the error made by the students. It was found that both highachieving and low-achieving students find difficulty solving problems. However, the low-achieving students found more difficulty when solving problems that required more thought rather than simply inputting information into an already provided equation. Data also showed that representation on paper helps the students obtain the correct answer, however, it does not guarantee a correct answer as it depended on how the representation was used. These findings show that difficulties and errors made by Maltese Chemistry students were very similar to those reported in literature.