Abstract:
The study sought to investigate the impact of student- and classroom/schoollevel
factors on eighth-grade math achievement in Ghanaian and Singaporean
students. Three research questions guided the study. A comparative research
design was adopted. The data was obtained from 7323 students nested within
161 schools in Ghana and 5251 students nested within 129 schools in
Singapore who participated in the 2011 Trends in International Mathematics
and Science Study (TIMSS). A school questionnaire, teacher questionnaire,
student questionnaire, and the TIMSS math achievement test were used to
collect data. Hierarchical Linear Modelling was used to analyse the data. The
study showed that 40.71% and 43.49% of the total variance in math
achievement were accounted for by school-level differences in Ghana and
Singapore, respectively. Meanwhile, the results showed that student-level
differences contributed to 59.29% and 56.51% of the total achievement of
Ghanaian and Singaporean students, respectively. The results also showed that
in both countries, the math achievement of eighth grade students was largely
influenced by student-level characteristics. At the student level, the results
showed that students' like for learning math and confidence in doing math
were the strongest contributors to the math achievement of the Ghanaian and
Singaporean students, respectively. At the school level, school discipline and
safety, as well as school emphasis on academic success, were the most
influential factors on Ghanaian and Singaporean students' mathematics
achievement, respectively. This study recommends that the Ministry of
Education and Ghana Education Service critically look at students‘
characteristics, which can be developed both at the classroom and school
levels, for improvement in their mathematics achievement.
