Categorizing Abilities And Academic Achievements

Modern cognitive psychologists believe that when we construct our own understandings of theworld, we first categorize the cognitive goal to find the similarities and differences. Therefore,categorization is the fundamental science in the construction of the world, and the categorizationapproach is the fundamental approach in achieving this goal. For example, science could beclassified into social and natural categories; school subjects could be classified into art and sciencecategories; the information on the Internet is classified as news, sports, entertainment and manyother categories. Even the drawers in your house might be classified accordingto their functions orother means. We believe that the categorizing ability is a symbol indicating learners'intelligence.However, is categorization teaching contents an effective way to improve students'academicachievements? Is there any correlation between students'categorizing abilities and academicachievements?Toanswerthesetwoquestions,thefollowingstudyisdesigned.In this study, a quantitative study through questionnaires was conducted among 141 ChineseGrade Nine students to compare the efficiency of their information reception and the correlationbetween students'categorizing abilities and academic achievements. Two kinds of questionnaireswere employed in the study, which are given the name Questionnaire I and Questionnaire II. Eachquestionnaireincludestwosections,Section1and2.Section1inQuestionnaireIcontains20words,which have already been categorized and distributed in the categorized order. Students whoanswered Questionnaire I were required to memorize the words within 1 minute and then writedown the words they could remember within another 1 minute. Meanwhile, Section 1 inQuestionnaire II covers the same 20 words, which are presented in a random order. Students forQuestionnaire II were required to memorize and write down the words they could remember too.Section2inbothquestionnairesrequiredstudentstocategorize22words inwordswithin3minutes.Students were divided into two groups to take the tests. Meanwhile, students were also classifiedwithin each group according to their academic achievements, with high, mid and low proficiencylevels. The results of the study show that the mean and maximum of the memorized words in thecategorized group are all higher than those in the uncategorized group. One striking data was fromthe maximum in two groups. In the categorized group, students of all proficiencylevel reported 20,while only one 19 from the uncategorized group in the high proficiency level. In comparingstudents'categorizing abilities with academic achievements, we found most relevant data from midandlowproficiencygroup.Through analyzing the study result, we conclude that it is effective to improve the students'...