Assessment in teaching and learning allows both instructor and students to evaluate the achievement, performance and improve upon it. The achievement test appears as one of the most commonly used assessment tools to determine students' gains in the cognitive domain. The study analysed science achievement test (SAT), a multiple-choice test for grade 10 senior secondary school students. The 50 SAT items were developed in compliance with the Malaysian science curriculum specification. The face and content validity of SAT were validated by experts in the science field. The SAT was administered with 50 students in a pilot study. The collected data was analysed using item analysis based on classical test theory (CTT) and Rasch analysis. In terms of difficulty index (p), item analysis showed that there were five difficult items, 33 moderately difficult items, and 12 easy items. Findings also reported eight items presented as poor items due to the poor discriminating power. The SAT showed a good coefficient of 0.862 for Kuder-Richardson 20 (KR-20) and 0.851 for the split half method. While the Rasch analysis showed a reliable and good separation for both item and person. Besides, the Rasch analysis displayed that there are two items should be refreshed or removed. The study revealed that the SAT was a solid, valid, and reliable tool, which is suitable to be used to measure the student’s achievement in science.

Student engagement is one of the indicators of a successful teaching and learning process. Many studies claim that student engagement is associated with the performance and achievement of students. In this study, the researchers aimed to determine the effects of science laboratory environments and science learning motivation towards student engagement in learning science among non-science students. 468 upper secondary non-science students in Sarawak were involved in this survey with the administration of three sets of questionnaires on science laboratory environment, science learning motivation and student engagement in science learning. Multiple regression was used to analyse the research questions. Both science laboratory learning environment (r = 0.523) and science learning motivation (r = 0.670) are found positively correlated to student engagement. The results also revealed that the science laboratory learning environment and science learning motivation are significant predictors of student engagement in learning science with R2 = 0.463. Specifically, student cohesiveness, open-endedness, integration and material environment in the science laboratory learning environment and all the dimensions of motivation predict student engagement in science learning. The findings suggest that educators, especially science teachers, should utilise the laboratory effectively and keep students motivated to ensure their active engagement in science learning.

The research is financed by Asian Development Bank. No. 2006-A171(Sponsoring information

Motivation has been identified as a great factor influencing the effectiveness of the teaching and learning process. This study aimed to look at the level of science learning motivation of students in rural secondary schools. The study was administered using a questionnaire on 237 Grade 11 students of a rural secondary schools who took general science subject. The data obtained were analyzed using Statistical Package for the Social Science Version 21.0 (SPSS 21.0) software. Mean scores and t-test were used to find out the level of student motivation and gender differences towards science learning. Findings show that both groups of male and female students have a high level of motivation to learn science. The learning foal orientation scale showed the highest mean value of 3.97 while the self -efficacy scale had the lowest mean score value of 3.57. The findings also show that there are significant differences between genders for the level of science learning motivation. Besides, the finding also showed that there is a strong and positive relation between science learning motivation and science achievement.