Either known to you or not, there may be many reasons which are not personal that can make a student fails WAEC exam. The reasons differ annually based on what it made available by the Council, Reasons Why Candidates Fail 2018 Biology WAEC Practical will be unveiled in this article.
The observed weaknesses of the candidates include:
- inability to relate structure with function of specimens;
- poor spelling of technical terms and one-word answers, e.g. Anthropoda, Atropoda, Arthropodia instead of Arthropoda and Insecter instead of Insecta;
- starting taxonomic names with small letter;
- breaking a single technical word into two words e.eg. House fly for Housefly;
- inability to title diagrams correctly;
- poor diagram of specimen K (Pride of Barbados flower) in question 4 (f);
- not including the magnification of the diagram;
- using un-ruled or crossing guidelines in labeling diagrams;
- using plural instead of singular for a single guideline;
- using guidelines that do not touch the structure;
- making diagrams without the correct specification;
- labeling with guidelines that are not ruled;
- drawing the wrong specimen and drawing off-hand making their answers have little or no link with the question asked;
- inability to mention specific habitats of organisms;
- inability to tabulate answers on differences;
- inability to compare specimens K (Pride of Barbados flower) and L (Elephant grass) correctly in question 4 (e).
WAEC Recommendations by the Chief Examiner
The Chief Examiner provides the following recommendation in view of mitigating the poor performance from the students, they are:
- students should be made to draw often in class, and be taught the basic skills of drawing;
- students should learn to use rulers to rule guidelines for labels;
- teachers should drill students on spellings so as to improve on their spelling of technical terms;
- students should be taught how to answer adaptation questions;
- students should write their answers themselves without external help;
- Chief Examiner’s Report should be made available to students and compulsory for teachers to read;
- teachers should attend seminars and workshops often;
- teachers should be encouraged to attend WAEC coordination and marking exercise.
Candidates General Strength
A good number of candidates complied satisfactorily in the following areas:
- writing answers neatly and clearly
- ability to answer the three questions required of them
- ability to follow the instructions of the questions
- ruling guidelines with pencil
- ability to name the organisms from which specimens C (Gill of fish), D (Lung of small mammal) and E (Dicotyledonous leaf) are obtained question 2 (a)
- ability to identify similarities between specimens
- ability to state the function common to specimens C (Gill offish), D (Lung of small mammal) and E (Dicotyledonous leaf) in question 2 (a) (ii);
- a few candidates could give good drawings of specimens C (Gill of fish) and K (Pride of Barbados flower) in questions 2 (c) and 4 (f);
- ability to name the floral parts of specimen K (Pride of Barbados flower) in question 4(a) (i);
- ability to give the theoretical reason for naming the sex of specimen K (Pride of Barbados flower) in question 4(b) (ii).
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