Exploring the Perceptions of Students and Graduate Teaching Assistants (GTAs) towards Recitation Sessions in a Calculus II Course
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Authors
Acharya, Bibek
Issue Date
2024
Type
Dissertation
Language
en_US
Keywords
Graduate Teaching Assistants , Mathematics Education , Perceptions , Recitations In Calculus II , Secondary Education , STEM Education
Alternative Title
Abstract
The National Science Foundation identified a shortage of STEM professionals in the United States. There is a dire need to promote STEM education to secure high-paying and skilled jobs for the country's residents and the overall healthy economy. This shortage is partly due to students' low retention and persistence to graduate in STEM fields. Due to a shortage of STEM professionals and low retention rates in STEM fields, universities have tried to increase the number of STEM graduates. Providing recitation sessions in challenging STEM courses might improve retention rates in STEM disciplines and ultimately mitigate current shortages of STEM professionals. This study explored students' and GTAs' perceptions of recitation sessions in Calculus II. Additionally, this study aimed to determine if recitation sessions are perceived as more beneficial to one gender or specific degree majors. Finally, this study identified the most preferred and most used academic support system for Calculus II. To address the research questions, students enrolled in Calculus II courses were surveyed, and the GTAs teaching the course's recitation sessions were interviewed. Approximately 200 students participated in the survey, and all five GTAs participated in the semi-structured interview. Students' overall perception of recitation sessions in the Calculus II course was found by averaging the overall responses to all six survey items on the Likert Scale. The results showed that students were in agreement with the various survey items, which indicates a positive perception of the recitation sessions. The Mann-Whitney U test was conducted to see if there is any difference in perception of recitation sessions in Calculus II between genders and between their degree majors. In both cases, the p-values were all found to be greater than the significance level of 0.05, showing no statistically significant difference in the median responses between the genders and majors. Among the five academic support mechanisms provided, recitation sessions were ranked first for most students. Similarly, the usage of recitation sessions was also higher than that of other support mechanisms. GTAs generally were found to be satisfied with the current format of the recitation sessions and hence agreed on the effectiveness of these sessions to the students and recommended it to their incoming students. Implications for future study and implications for practice are provided.