Analytical Separation Method is a chemistry course offered at Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM), Malaysia. This course covers the application of chromatographic techniques, whereby students must be able to describe the principles and terminologies used and relate them with suitable analogies. A strong understanding of this course plays a major role in the development of solid knowledge amongst graduates to survive in the job market. An auspicious method to understand the analytical separation method has not been identified so far, therefore, limits their opportunities for career development in the future. According to the Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK) method, teachers must first understand the knowledge before presenting the information to students during the teaching process. If we can recognise this concept clearly, efforts towards the teaching of science will lead to a new achievement. Analogy-based teaching was found to be capable of increasing students' understanding with regards to the subject matter. The present research successfully identified the level of understanding towards terminology and analogy along with the readiness of students to use an alternative teaching method across campuses, and the readiness concerning the usage of different interactive teaching tools. Quantitative measurement was conducted via SPSS using a sample of 128 students from four different campuses. Based on the analysis, most of the students faced difficulties in accurately translating and relating to the terminologies (57.8%) and analogies (55.5%) concerning the theories without proper guidance. According to the overall mean score (4.18), the range of positive agreement signified the student’s readiness towards the usage of interactive tools during teaching and learning sessions. There was no significant difference in students’ level of understanding on analogy across campuses, however, a significant difference was found in students’ level of understanding on terminologies used across campuses. In pairwise comparisons, there was a statistically significant difference (p-value = 0.009 < 0.05) between Kuala Pilah (K) and Arau (A) campuses.

The yield of amorphous silica has less residue of mineral content in rice husk (RH) and a high specific surface area through the simple alkaline extraction process at first, then acid precipitation of RH. At this time, the leaching process using alkali and calcination of RH is the best method to acquire amorphous silica with a high surface area. The different temperatures were used for the calcination of RH and continue with sodium hydroxide (NaOH) treatment by using different concentration. The sample titrated using hydrochloric acid (HCl) to extract silica. Pretreatment with acid leaching for the RH was also conducted before the calcination of the RH. Results acquired were analysed and compared.

The research represented here is oriented towards developing a new approach to functionalise a surface of Magnetic Nanoparticles with Polypyrrole (MNPs-PPy). This development will then applied to remove 2,4 dinitrophenol (2,4-DNP) in aqueous solution. A various analytical technique such as Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR) analysis, Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM), X-ray Diffraction (XRD) was employed for complete characterisation of MNPs-PPy. FT-IR spectra have shown the peak of Fe-O at 580 cm-1 while; the SEM images illustrated the globular structure of the surface of MNPs-PPy. Also, XRD result has shown the MNPs-PPy is in the crystalline form. The ultimate aims would then be the optimisation of the superlative condition of several parameters such as effect pH, temperature and concentration, contact time, amount of adsorbent, interfering ions and reusability for the removal of (2,4-DNP) in an aqueous solution by MNPs-PPy. The optimum conditions were observed at pH 6, 318 K, 10 ppm of analyte, 75 minutes and 50 mg of adsorbents which shown 98.67 % removal of analyte.

Surfactants also known as surface-active agents are one of the water pollutants that can lead to the deterioration of the environment.In this study, activated carbon was prepared from date seeds (DAC) by using phosphoric acid as an activating agent.The activation process was carried out at 500 °C for two hours.DAC was characterized by Fourier-Transformed Infrared Spectrometer (FTIR), Field Emission Scanning Electron Microscopy (FESEM), Energy-Dispersive X-Ray Spectroscopy (EDX) and Nitrogen Adsorption at 77 K.The BET surface area of DAC was 1187 m 2 /g.The adsorption capacities of surfactants (CTAB and TX-100) were determined.This study showed that the adsorption capacity of CTAB (23.0724 mg/g) onto DAC was greater than TX-100 (11.3868 mg/g).The adsorption process between both surfactants onto DAC was done by physisorption through electrostatic forces.Thus, this study showed that the date seeds have a greater tendency to be microporous activated carbon and an adsorbent for surfactants recovery.

This paper examines the ranking of contributing factors of failure in the examination result of non-accounting students in completing an Introduction to Accounting course. A questionnaire survey was conducted to a total of 142 non-accounting students who took Introduction to Accounting course for a semester. The results reveal that the major contributing factors of failure are this subject being a non preferred course, non availability of lecturers after class hours, ambiguous questions in the final exam and accommodation problems. In addition, by using chi-square analysis, the result also shows that proportion of male students who passed is significantly different to the proportion of female students who passed the exam. The result also shows that there is a significant relationship between prior knowledge in accounting and performance in Introduction to Accounting course. This study is unique as it considers the students performance in a subject that is not the main discipline of the students (i.e., accounting course for non-accounting students).