The relative effectiveness of teaching methods on pupils' understanding of the classification of living organisms at two levels of intelligence

Abstract

A classification task, involving the sorting of pictures of plants and animals into major orders and classes, and a standardised test of general intelligence, were administered to randomly selected groups of 12 year old pupils drawn from four comprehensive schools. Sub-samples were selected at random of pupils of above and below average intelligence who had been taught classification either by the “Nuffield” approach or by a “traditional” method. Analysis of variance of the scores obtained showed that although the achievement of the upper intelligence group was superior (1 %level) to that of the lower intelligence group, there was a significant interaction (5 % level) between the method of teaching that had been received and intellectual level. Pupils of above average intelligence generally obtained higher scores when they had been taught by the “Nuffield” method, whereas the achievement of pupils of below average intelligence was generally much greater when they had been taught by a “traditional” method.