Effect of Experiential Learning on Students’ Motivation and Interest at Elementary Level in the Subject of General Science

Abstract

The research was conducted to explore the effect of experiential learning on students’ motivation and interest at elementary levels in the subject of General Science. The purposes of research were, (i) to measure the influence of experiential studying on student’s motivation towards learning, (ii) to examine the influence of experiential learning on student’s interest toward learning. The null hypothesis were designed to test the objectives as (i) there was no meaningful difference among the motivation of experimental groups and control groups, (ii) no significant difference was there between the mean scores of experimental group and control group on post-test. The 5^th class students of WAPDA Senior Model School Tarbela Dam Project was taken randomly as example of research. The research was experimental in nature. The pretest, posttest Equivalent Group Designs was used. Both experimental and control groups had equated upon the footing of researcher made pre-test scores. Both groups were exposed to same course but their style of learning was different. Experiential learning method was selected for experimental group for the period of six weeks duration. Researcher made pretest, posttest and observations sheets used as data collection tools. The data was investigated by employing mean score and t-test. Results indicate that the students of experimental group was more motivated resultantly they performed significantly better than control groups upon posttest presenting the supremacy of the experiential learning upon old-style learning. It was found through observation sheet that experiential learning developed strong motivation and interest in experimental group students. It was concluded that experiential learning was effective in teaching science at elementary grade. It was recommended that the teachers should be trained to teach students by experiential learning. The training institution should train the teachers to use different methods of teaching such as experiential learning. In this way all the students’ motivation and interest will increase. Resultantly students’ academic performance will also increase.