A correlational study of students' theoretical and practical examinations scores in computer applications courses in Bayero University Kano

Abstract

Computer Application Packages I and II are courses offered by students of Computer Science with Economics in Bayero University, Kano, Nigeria, in year 1 and year II respectively. The examination of all these courses consists of two aspects; the theory aspect and the practical aspect. These two aspects are vital and are expected to complement each other. In other words, for a student to do well in any of the courses, he/she must perform well in both the theoretical and practical aspects of the examination. This paper is aimed at finding the correlation that exists between students’ theoretical and practical performance in the two courses. A total of 100 students that haven taken the two courses were used in this research. Using the Pearson Product Moment Correlation Coefficient, the Coefficients of Correlation obtained are 0.644, 0.560, 0.718, 0.909 and 0.454. These results showed that there is a statistically significant and strong positive relationship between students' theoretical and practical scores as a result of which the null hypotheses were rejected.