Prior to the lesson, the students, as a whole, in both the control group and the experimental group seemed very uncomfortable with the material and students felt unprepared as they “didn’t have time to study.” Students commented that the test was “hard,” “confusing,” and “unfair.” Many students expressed their frustrations about being tested on material that they had not yet covered in class.

As expected, student comments in the experimental group reflected an increase in comfort level with the material after the lesson when compared to their pre-test comments. The experimental group, consisting of 21 students, scored an average of 60% on the post-test, which was a significant increase from the 35.2% average on the pre-test. One student explained that  “I understand the process and how everything works and I can tell you how everything happens in order, but I don’t know the names. I get confused on the names.” The significant increase in test score after the lesson indicates that students in the inquiry-based learning class are gaining an understanding of the concepts being covered and misconceptions are beginning to be addressed.

The control group, comprised of 25 students, scored an average of a 39% on the post-test, which dropped slightly from their pre-test average of 38.7%. Student comments indicated that the post-test “was a little easier now that I know some of the questions on the test,” but “next time we should be given time to study.” Students in the control group scored slightly lower on the post-test than they did on the original pre-test. This indicates that students do not fully understand the concepts being taught using traditional methods. In addition, student misconceptions were not cleared up through the traditional teaching methods.

To verify results through further experimentation, improvements may need to be made to the experimental design. Donniell, the classroom teacher, felt that students did not understand the wording of question 4, indicating that some of the assessment questions may need to be reworded or restructured. A number of suggestions have been made to improve lesson design (see Results section).

Students in the experimental group scored significantly higher on the post-test than students in the control group, indicating that the inquiry-based methods used were more effective for teaching 9^th grade Biology students at CHAD about the cell cycle than the traditional methods used for this lesson. The results of this study negate the initial hypothesis that there would be no significant difference between direct instruction and inquiry-based learning when teaching the cell cycle. Further experimentation is needed to gain a fuller understanding of the differences between direct instruction and inquiry-based learning. Donniell’s plan is to teach her third period class the inquiry-based cell cycle lesson using the suggested modifications beginning marking period. The third period class has not yet been taught biology through inquiry.