Connection between prior knowledge and student achievement in engineering mathematics

Abstract

In the paper the author reports on connections between first-year engineering mathematics students’ prior mathematical knowledge and their achievement in an engineering mathematics (year) course in an extended curriculum programme. The importance of links between prior knowledge in learning and performance is widely supported in educational studies, also in learning mathematics. Furthermore, the transition from school to university is a substantial hurdle in the learning trajectory of many students, and particularly in science and engineering courses. The author exposed students to a carefully designed diagnostic entrance test that consists of different content and knowledge components, and correlated these results, by means of regression analysis, with students’ achievement scores at the end of term 1, term 2, and the first semester. The results show a moderate correlation. This research is meant as the beginning of exploring possibilities to predict study success in mathematics by means of an entrance test and of developing possibilities of remedying students’ entrance deficiencies and thus increasing study success. More broadly, this inquiry was conducted to explore adequate ways of assessing prior knowledge that could be useful in supporting students’ learning of engineering mathematics in a South African context.