Effectiveness of Blended Teaching on Academic Achievement in Organic Chemistry: A case of Grade-12 Learners from an Underprivileged South African School

In South Africa, particularly in underprivileged high schools, the unavailability of resources means that the use of traditional face-to-face teaching methods that promote passive learning is prevalent. Despite a few of these schools utilising blended teaching methods that can potentially promote active learning, research that evaluates the effectiveness of these methods in promoting academic achievement is limited. Diagnostic reports on National Senior Certificate examinations of South Africa show that Grade-12 learners perform poorly in organic chemistry. Therefore, this study which was conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic, aimed to determine how effective blended teaching methods are in fostering academic achievement compared to traditional face-to-face teaching, focusing on Grade-12 organic chemistry. In this quantitative study, using Vygotsky’s socio-cultural and Maslow’s hierarchy of needs theories as the theoretical framework, two hundred learners were randomly placed into two equal groups. Group-1 (experimental) was taught all organic chemistry concepts stipulated in the South African national curriculum using a blended teaching method while Group-2 (control) was taught the same concepts using traditional face-to-face teaching method. A standardised test (KOOCT) was administered to both groups followed by descriptive and inferential statistical analyses (independent t-tests). Findings showed that Group-1 scores (M = 41.74, SD = 19.533) were higher than those for Group-2 (M = 27.18, SD = 13.039), t (198) = 6.234, p = .00 < .05 showing that using blended teaching approach was more effective in promoting academic achievement than traditional face-to-face teaching only. The effect size (Cohen’s d=.882) ensures practical significance of the study.