Teaching Approaches to Minimize Students’ Anxiety and Attitudes in Mathematics

This quasi-experimental study aimed to discover a teaching approach in Mathematics that can minimize the students’ Mathematics anxiety and turn the students’ apprehensions into positive attitudes toward Mathematics. The study was conducted at Misamis Oriental General Comprehensive High School, with 104 grade 10 students who belong to the regular section serving as the respondents. There were 52 students randomly assigned to the control and experimental groups who were exposed to manipulatives with student-student discourse and to a kinesthetic teaching approach, respectively. In both control and experimental groups, 26 students were assigned in groups with reward, and 26 were assigned in groups without reward during the conduct of the activities. Pretest and posttest of the Mathematics Anxiety Self-test and Mathematics Attitude Test were given to both groups before and after the treatment. The result of the study revealed that a kinesthetic teaching approach and teaching using manipulatives with student-student discourse have the same effect on students’ attitudes toward Mathematics. Both the control and experimental groups of students have a moderately positive attitude towards Mathematics after the intervention. Regarding to Mathematics anxiety levels, the study revealed a significant difference in favor of the experimental group. Students exposed to a kinesthetic teaching approach have a lesser Mathematics anxiety level. Hence, the researcher recommends using a kinesthetic teaching approach to minimize the Mathematics anxiety of the students and to turn their negative attitude toward Mathematics into something moderately positive.