Formative Assessment, Mathematical Ability and Attitude of Students in Parametric Measurement on Concept of Heat Energy

The study investigated the effects of formative assessment, mathematics ability and attitude on academic achievement of students on parametric measurements on Heat energy. A total of sixty students were randomly drawn into equal two groups of experimentation and control. The instruments for the study were the Formative Assessment on Parametric Measurement Test on Heat (FAPMH), Mathematical Ability Test on Heat Energy (MATHE) and Physics Learners Attitude Scale (PLAS-Taghap & Addani, 2024). The reliability coefficient of the validated instruments FAPMH and MATHE was determine using KR 20 formula as 0.72 and 0.84 respectively. Findings are that students in the experimental group had higher mean score in parametric measurement of Heat Energy than those in the control group. The comparison between the experimental Group mathematics scores and the control Group mathematics scores shows a mean difference of 5.73, with a standard deviation of 12.83 and a standard error of 2.34. The t-value of 2.45 with a p-value of 0.021 also indicates a statistically significant difference between the two groups at the 5% level of significance. This finding suggests that the experimental group demonstrated better performance in mathematics compared with the control group. Similarly, the mean difference between the experimental physics assessment score and the control physics assessment score is 10.70, with a standard deviation of 12.87 and a standard error mean of 2.35. The calculated t-value of 4.56 with a p-value of 0.000 indicates that the difference between the two groups is statistically significant at the 0.05 level. This implies that the students in the experimental group performed significantly better than those in the control group in the physics assessment on the concept of heat energy measurement. The significance of this difference suggests that the instructional strategy or treatment applied to the experimental group may have had a positive influence on students’ understanding of the concept. Hence, the mathematical ability of the experimental group was greater than math ability of those in the control group. There was a significant difference between students’ performance in parametric measurement on Heat Energy. Students with high mathematical ability performed higher than those with low ability irrespective of their attitude Based on the findings of the study, it is recommended that students be taught measurements of physical parameters in Heat energy using the formative assessment program if the academic achievement of the students would improve.