Thesis Abstract and Dissertation Abstracts

This study investigated the efficacy of positive reinforcements in improving the performance in Mathematics of selected elementary pupils who are at-risk learning disabled in Mathematics.  The research design was pre-experimental particularly one group pretest/posttest design.  The subjects consisted of eleven (11) grade four pupils who were considered at-risk learning disabled.  The study was conducted for ten (10) weeks or one grading period.

The pretest and posttest were analyzed with Wilcoxon Signed Ranks Test.  The results showed that there was no significant difference on the performance of the selected pupils in Mathematics when interceded with positive reinforcements.  Therefore, positive reinforcements used in the study were not effective.  It was also concluded that the subjects might not be mentally ready to learn the topics in grade four Mathematics because they were all at-risk learning disabled in Mathematics.  Further, the short duration (one grading period) may be a factor that influenced the result.

With this, it was recommended that teachers may not only focus on only one type of reinforcement but to use other types of reinforcements or combination of other behavior modification techniques to determine the effective reinforcement appropriate to the pupils who are at-risk learning disabled in Mathematics.  It is also recommended that parents may work hand in hand with the teachers in improving the performance of at-risk learning disabled children, that a longer period regarding the implementation of positive reinforcements to figure if the results will still be the same, and that a further study of positive reinforcement may be conducted in another school and/or grade level to explore more on its effects in a different setting and in a different grade level.