Factors Predicting Turkish and Korean Students’ Science and Mathematics Achievement in TIMSS 2011

Abstract

This study makes an important contribution to an expanding body of international comparative studies by exploring factors predicting differences in science and mathematics achievement by students in Turkey and the Republic of Korea on the 2011 TIMSS assessment. While these countries are similar with regards to population size, cultural beliefs about education, and public expenditure on education, students in each country have different levels of achievement in science and mathematics. The current research investigated how aptitude, instruction, and environment related factors predict Turkish and Korean students' achievement in science and mathematics. In both countries, some factors, such as student aptitude (e.g., science self-efficacy) and environmental (e.g., parental educational level) factors significantly predicted students' science and mathematics achievement. However, we found some differences between the two countries regarding certain classroom environmental variables, such as bullying and student sense of belonging at school. We discuss educational implications for these findings.

Identifying the Classification Performances of Educational Data Mining Methods: A Case Study for TIMSS

“…The educational system should clearly be focused on enhancing students' confidence, and students should be more motivated in order to be more successful. Additionally, the association between parents' highest education level and academic achievement has been found significant in many studies (Berberoğlu, Çelebi, Özdemir, Uysal, & Yayan 2003;Topçu et al, 2016;Wößmann, 2005). This is a general idea, not only for Turkish eighth-grade students, but also for all students in the education system.…”

“…Higher parental educational levels positively correlate with students' academic achievement. Topçu et al (2016) suggested evening classes or summer institutions for students' lesser educated parents in order to increase their knowledge and awareness. Also, educational resources are another important indicator of success, and students who can reach educational resources easily are generally included in successful groups.…”

“…Standard statistical procedures such as regression analysis, multilevel modeling, and factor analysis have been widely applied using students' characteristics as influencing factors when investigating science and mathematics achievement. (Kilic & Askin, 2013;Neuschmidt, Barth, & Hastedt, 2008;Schreiber, 2002;Topçu, Erbilgin, & Arıkan, 2016;Wößmann, 2005). As mentioned previously, however, these methods have some drawbacks, especially with abnormally distributed data.…”

Cross-National Comparisons of Students’ Science Success Based on Gender Variability: Evidence From Timss

“…While doing this, a different set of factors regarded as potentially effective on success has been considered. As was pointed out by Topçu, Erbilgin, and Arıkan (2016), finding the significant factors associated with students' success offers significant insights on low success and provides a guidance on which revisions are needed in the current curriculum to enhance success. To this end, a set of factors which can be seen as important causes of crossnational difference in students' science success was handled in this research.…”

“…On the other hand, Students Like Learning (SL), Students Confident (SC) and Students Value (SV) scales are created separately for each specific content. Except SSB, numerous studies have been conducted to investigate the importance of these scales on students' success (Kaya & Rice, 2010;Lai, Ye, & Chang, 2008;Smith, Pasero, & McKenna, 2014;Thomson, 2008;Tsai & Yang, 2015;Topçu, Erbilgin, & Arıkan, 2016). Since SSB scale is newly created, a limited number of studies dealing with its effect have been available (Hu, Leung, & Chen, 2018;Smith et al, 2019).…”