Stuck in a Lockdown: Filipino Students' Odyssey of Resilience

The COVID-19 outbreak in the Philippines forced schools to close. Many Filipino students were stranded in their dormitories and boarding houses due to government-imposed lockdowns. As the study's impetus, the researchers explored the phenomenon of stranded students during a pandemic. A transcendental phenomenological inquiry was conducted in Northern Mindanao, Philippines, to disclose the experiences of six stranded students. Stranded students' lifeworld throughout the lockdown was documented through phenomenological interviews. The phenomenological reduction technique was used to transcribe and analyze the data. Provisional codes were used to classify critical statements into themes for the initial analysis of the interview data. The research revealed the themes of (a) groping in the dark, (b) journeying towards the light, and (c) welcoming the breaking dawn. The various stages of reality in the life of the stranded students are shown in these topics. They relate the story of how their confinement experience taught them to be resilient, which covers resilience as a process. The paper discusses numerous pedagogical implications of the phenomenon

Differentiated Scaffolding Strategies in Triangle Congruence: Their Effects on Learners’ Academic Performance and Confidence in Mathematics

The benefits of differentiated scaffolding strategies on boosting academic performance and confidence in Mathematics learners were studied in this paper. Quasi-experimental research was conducted at a state university’s Secondary School Laboratory in the Philippines. It involved sixty Grade 8 learners, 30 from the control group and 30 from the experimental group. A panel of specialists assessed developed lessons on triangle congruence topics and the academic performance test and confidence scale. The developed lesson, test, and scale were improved after the panel of experts’ comments and suggestions were considered. The instruments were pilot tested and came out reliable; the academic performance test had a Cronbach alpha of 0.807, while the confidence scale in Mathematics had a Cronbach alpha of 0.810. In addition, the mean, standard deviation, One-way Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA), and Pearson Product Moment Correlation were used to analyze the data. The findings demonstrated that when learners were taught using differentiated scaffolding strategies, their academic performance significantly increased at the Fairly Satisfactory level. However, when they were taught using conventional teaching strategies, their academic performance remained at Did Not Meet Expectations. The performance outcomes of both groups were significantly different. Also, there was no significant difference in learners’ confidence between the two groups when compared. Furthermore, there was a significant link between academic performance and confidence in Mathematics among students taught using differentiated scaffolding methodologies. Thus, concerns about increasing learners’ mathematical literacy may be addressed with differentiated scaffolding strategies