Results on Communication Assessment - Evaluation and testing of solution in practice

6.3. Evaluation and testing of solution in practice

6.3.3. Results on Communication Assessment

Logical and Numerical Skills

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Q31 Q32 Q33 Q34 Q35 Q36 Q37 Q38 Q39 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q44 Q45

Questions

Marks in Percent

Buhlebemf undo Qhakaza Tholokuhle UND Unizulu

(a)

Logical and Numerical Skills

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Q46 Q47 Q48 Q49 Q50 Q51 Q52 Q53 Q54 Q55 Q56 Q57 Q58 Q59 Q60 Questions

Marks in Percent

Buhlebemfundo Qhakaza Tholokuhle UND Unizulu (b)

Figure 6.5: Logical and numerical skills results for the 5 schools.

86 6.3.3.1. Structuring Sentences

Questions 61 to 64 of this part of the assessment instrument investigated the ability of students to write well-structured English sentences with the correct tense. Learners had to choose the correct word from the four provided multiple-choice alternatives. The overall mean for the participating schools was 64.6% and Buhlebemfundo averaged 57.1%, Qhakaza 61.8%, Tholokuhle 47.1%. However university students outperformed the school participants with UKZN at 90.7% and 68.3% for UniZulu (Fig. 6.6).

Structuring Sentences

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Q61 Q62 Q63 Q64

Questions

Mean Score in Percent

Buhlebemfundo Qhakaza Tholokuhle UKZN Unizulu

Figure 6.6: Charts illustrating scores on Structuring Sentences represented in percentage.

Question 61 wanted learners to insert into blank space (a) “retards” in order to form a sentence

“Refrigerating meats (a) ‘retards’ the spread of bacteria”. The correct answer was secured by 60.2% of all learners with Tholokuhle and Qhakaza attaining low means of 39.2% and 46%

respectively. UniZulu had 60%, Buhlebemfundo 61.9% and UKZN 92.5%.

Question 62 needed learners to choose (b) to form a sentence “Throughout the animal kingdom,

‘only the whale is’ bigger than the elephant. The correct answer was chosen by 69.4% of the participants. Tholokuhle had the lowest mean of 51% followed by Buhlebemfundo with 56.8%.

Qhakaza had the mean of 80.8%, UKZN 92.5% and UniZulu 73.3%.

Question 63 majority of students (54.5%) chose the correct answer (b) which helped to

construct the sentence “The fact ‘that’ money orders can usually be easily clased has made them a popular form of payment”. Again, learners from high schools performed poorly with 46.6%

for Qhakaza, Buhlebemfundo 35.3% and Tholokuhle 37.2%. Universities had higher means of 85.1% and 60% for UKZN and UniZulu, respectively.

For question 64 learners were supposed to form the sentence “The constitution of South Africa gives parliament ‘the power’ to pass laws. Majority of learners 74.2% chose the right answer (a). Buhlebemfundo averaged 74.5%, Qhakaza 73.3%, Tholokuhle 60.8%, UKZN 92.5% and UniZulu 79.9%.

6.3.3.2. Written Expressions

Six questions were used to test the ability of learners to give well structured English sentences by identifying the part of each sentence that was not appropriately written (Fig. 6.7). With the exception of UKZN, with the mean of 51.9%, no other school scored above 50%.

Buhlebemfundo had the mean score of 34.9 %, Qhakaza 48.8%, and Tholokuhle 46.4% and UniZulu 41%.

Written Expressions

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Q65 Q66 Q67 Q68 Q69 Q70

Questions

Mean Score in Percent

Buhlebemfundo Qhakaza Tholokuhle UKZN Unizulu

Figure 6.7: Charts illustrating scores on Written Expression represented in percentage

For question 65 the overall mean was 59.5% with Buhlebemfundo averaging 47.3%, Qhakaza 57.7%, Tholokuhle 54.9%, UKZN 88.8% and UniZulu 43.3%. Learners were supposed to choose (c) “with” as it was the word which made the expression wrong.

For question 66 the correct answer was “identification” as it made the expression to be wrong.

The overall performance for all schools was 57.4% and UKZN was the highest with the mean of 96.2%. The lowest were Buhlebemfundo and UniZulu with 38.2% and 40%, respectively.

Qhakaza had 57.7% while Tholokuhle settled for 54.9%.

Question 67 with the overall mean of 46.8% was poorly performed. All groups excluding UKZN with the score of 81.4% had poor score. Buhlebemfundo had 14.6%; Qhakaza 42.4%;

Tholokuhle 39.2%; UniZulu 36.3%. Learners could not discern that the word making the expression wrong was (a) “deficient”.

For question 68 (c) “foot” was the incorrect word that made the sentence to lack consistency of numbers. All schools averaged less than 50% except UKZN with mean of 92.5%. Therefore, it was mostly UKZN learners who realised that “foot” referred to the two front feet of the gopher.

Buhlebemfundo attained 40.1%, Qhakaza 30.8%, Tholokuhle 37.2% and UniZulu 40%.

For question 69, with the overall mean of 59.8%, Buhlebemfundo scored the lowest marks 38.2%, followed by UniZulu with 40%. Other schools scored above 50% with Qhakaza achieving 61.6%, Tholokuhle 58.8% and UKZN 88.8%. Almost 40% of learners pluralized the name Mark Shuttleworth by choosing (d) “them” which made the sentence incorrect.

For question 70 again, except UKZN with 81.6%, other schools performed poorly and Buhlebemfundo 31% and Tholokuhle with 33.3% were the worst performers followed by Qhakaza with 42.4% and 46.6% for UniZulu. The overall performance for learners was 46.9%

and these few realised that (d) “more large” is grammatically incorrect.

The results show that learners could not determine if English expression were well written or not. This explains most learners’ inability to communicate in English by the time they reach tertiary education.

6.3.3.3. Reading Comprehension

In this section ten questions were used to measure learners’ ability to read and understand short passages similar in style to those found in tertiary institutions. Learners read a passage followed by a number of questions related to the passage. Again, there was poor performance regarding the reading comprehension skills (Fig. 6.8 below). The overall mean for all schools was low at 48.9% with none of the high schools averaging more than 50%. The mean scores were 33% for Buhlebemfundo, 46% for Qhakaza, and 37.7% for Tholokuhle. However, UKZN had 77% and UniZulu exactly 50.6%.

Questions most learners performed well on were those requiring simply pointing to the answer in the passage and not involving any thinking or problem-solving skills.

Question 71 wanted to ascertain whether learners understood the essence of the passage and 68.7% selected the correct answer (b) “Kenyan politics” with all school scoring above 50%.

Qhakaza was the highest with 80.8% followed by UKZN with 74%. Buhlebemfundo had 61.9%, Tholokuhle 66.6% and UniZulu with 53.3% the lowest.

Question 72 also wanted to find out what “the word ‘they’ in line 2” referred to and only 63.8%

of all learners chose the correct answer (c) “John and Charles”. Only Qhakaza attained a lower than 50% mean of 33% while UKZN was the highest with 92.8%. Buhlebemfundo was 67.4%, Tholokuhle 72.6% and UniZulu 56.6%. For question 73 only 51.1% of all learners gave the correct answered (d) “appealing” which was closest in meaning to “charismatic”. The means were high for the universities as UKZN had 74% and UniZulu 79.9% and were low for the high schools as Buhlebemfundo had 21.9%, Qhakaza 30.8 %, Tholokuhle 19.6%.

Question 74 tried to discover what the two men enjoyed and the answer was (a) “the buzz of the city” and 55.8% of all students got it correct. Only Qhakaza and UKZN passed with 61.6% and 85.1% respectively. Buhlebemfundo had the mean of 27.3%, Tholokuhle 33.3% and Qhakaza 43.3%. Question 80 wanted learners to point in the passage where it showed that the bus had problems, and 73.6% of all learners gave the correct answer (c) “line 31”. Buhlebemfundo had 34.6%, Qhakaza 80.8%, Tholokuhle 60.8%, UKZN 96.2% and Unizulu 56.6%.

Many second language English speakers gave wrong answers where questions needed inferences to the passage and deeper level of thinking was expected.

Question 75 asked which phrase had the closest meaning to “bumming around” and the correct answer (b) “sitting down and doing nothing”, was chosen by 34.7% of the learners with Buhlebemfundo averaging 23.7%, Qhakaza 27%, Tholokuhle 37.2% UniZulu 26.6%, and UKZN - 48.1%. About 42% of learners, Buhlebemfundo’s 38.2%, Qhakaza’s 65.4%, UKZN’s 48.1% and 46.7% from UniZulu, chose the wrong answer (a) “running from place to place” not (b) even though the passage states that the two had lost their jobs and were not doing anything.

Question 76 asked learners to choose the statement the author mentioned as not important in order to change society. The total number of learners choosing the correct answer (b) “fast talking politicians” was 36.8% and only UKZN with 63% averaged more than 50% as Buhlebemfundo had 18.2%, Qhakaza 34.7%, Tholokuhle 19.6% and UniZulu 30%. Many learners chose the wrong answer (c) “representing the voices of the voiceless”, for example, Buhlebemfundo 29.1%, Qhakaza 30.8%, Tholokuhle 31.4%, and UniZulu 23.3%.

Question 77 asked students what John and Charles joined. The passage explicitly stated that they joined (d) “one of the opposition parties” and only 57% got that correct. All high schools attained less than 40% on this question with Buhlebemfundo 27.3%, Qhakaza 38.5% and Tholokuhle 21.6%. The two universities had high means, UKZN 88.8% and UniZulu 79.9%.

The wrong answer (c) “rioting groups of the village” was selected by Buhlebemfundo’s 38.2%, Qhakaza’s 34.6%, Tholokuhle’s 37.3%, UniZulu’s 26.7%, and 11.1% of UKZN’s.

Question 78 asked which phrase meant change brought about by the ordinary people and only 33.1% of learners gave the correct answer (a) “change taking place from grassroots level

upward”. Buhlebemfundo had the mean of 21.9%, Qhakaza 19.3%, Tholokuhle 13.8%, UniZulu 59.2%, and UKZN 40%. An equal number of students (30.3%) chose the wrong answer (c)

“relationship is in the eating together” (Buhlebemfundo with 27.3%, Qhakaza 38.5%, Tholokuhle 39.2%, UKZN 33.3%, and UniZulu 13.3%).

Question 79 asked which phrase had the closest meaning to “was out the door” and the correct answer (a) “leaving” was chosen by 53.5% of all learners. Buhlebemfundo scored 25.5%;

Qhakaza 53.9%, Tholokuhle 31.4%; UniZulu 88.8%, UKZN 40%.

Question 80 wanted learners to point in the passage where it showed that the bus had problems.

The correct answer (c) “line 31” which states that the bus had a flat tyre was chosen by 73.6%

of all learners. Buhlebemfundo with 34.6% was the only one that did not get the answer correct.

Qhakaza had 80.8%, Tholokuhle 60.8%, UKZN 96.2% and UniZulu 56.6%.

Reading Comprehension

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Q71 Q72 Q73 Q74 Q75 Q76 Q77 Q78 Q79 Q80 Questions

Mean Score in Percent

Buhlebemfundo Qhakaza Tholokuhle UKZN Unizulu

Figure 6.8: Charts illustrating scores on reading comprehension represented in percentage.

Dalam dokumen The role of computer games and social constructivism in skills development of learners from different educational backgrounds. (Halaman 96-102)