CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Background of the Study
It is no longer news that one of the most difficult job in the world today is teaching. The challenges that informs this difficulty are numerous ranging from poor remuneration of teachers, indiscipline among the learners, lack of parental support attitude of the learners towards learning, the challenges posed by English language as a second language, availability and utilization facilities, the ability of the teacher to effectively transmit the needed signal that will bring the expected behavioral change in the learners. These and many more challenges are the factors militating against teaching effectiveness.
This research shall place emphasis on availability and utilization of instructional materials in teaching and learning of biology in senior secondary school for the purpose of clarity and adequate understanding teaching is a gradual process of transmitting signals, ideas and information to the learner from the teaching using some techniques. Similarly in the view of Alakpa (2010) teaching is defined as a gradual processing transmitting new ideas from the teacher to the learner through careful and selected techniques. In the view of Enekpa (2010) teaching said to not to taken place unless the content of the phenomenon of interest has been transmitted which in turn is expected to bring the expected behavioral chance which distinguished human being from animals. Furthermore, Abu (2000) opined that without teaching, every action of an individual is ignorance. Teaching is therefore imperative and unavailable if mankind must live peaceful and maximize fully the real essence of existence.Biology is a natural science that involves the study of life and living organism, including their physical structure, chemical composition, function, development and evolution. Modern biology is a vast field, composed of many branches. Despite the broad scope and the complexity of the science, there are certain unifying concepts that consolidate it into a single, coherent field. Biology recognized the cell as the basic unit of life, genes as the engine that propels the creation of new species. Living organisms are open system that survives by transforming energy and deceasing their local entropy to maintain a stable and vital condition defined as homeistasm see glossary of biology.
For effective teaching and learning to be achieved the teachers must employ many techniques and diplomacy on such a way that the new idea to be in learnt its well communicated. One of the techniques in transmitting these signals is through the use of instructional materials methodologies of teaching, leadership style at the classroom level, personality training and the ability to take care of the individual differences among learning at all levels of learning. The current study shall be particular about the importance of instructional materials, its availability and utilization and its effects on the academic achievement of the learners in secondary school in biology.
Instructional materials can be described in the vies of Ola (2000) as all those instructional aid as which can be visual, audio and audio visual provided in the teaching and learning situation (real or improvised) to concretize learning and remove sense of abstraction from learning. Agu (2011) holds a similar view about teaching aid as any arrangement, object, material, real or improvised brought into learning enhance the understanding of the learner other than the normal expression of the teacher in teaching and learning categorically, we have three basic classes of instructional materials namely audio instructional materials, visual instructional materials and the audio visual instructional materials.
Audio instructional materials are those materials that occur basically auditory sense examples of this of instructional material are radio, tape recorder, speaker etc. visual instructional materials are those materials that occurs only to the sight examples of this type of materials are posters, pictures, real objects etc. the audio visual materials as the name implies are those materials that occur both to the sense of auditory and the sight, examples of audio visual materials are television, telegram, video etc, instructional materials plays a important roles in teaching and learning process. It enhances that memory level of the students. At this time that educational has spread wide and entry oral teaching cannot be the key to successful pedagogy, therefore the teachers has to use instructional materials to make teaching and learning process interesting (Nic Hulls, 2003 Raw 2006).
According to Bina (2010) instructional materials are tools locally made or imported that help to facilitate the teaching/learning process. Obanga view them as materials things which are use to compose ported that could make tremendous enhancement of intellectual use impact the instructional materials can enhance the learning achievement since it removes the sense of abstract and concretize idea especially in biology which is more practical oriented. (Robach 2009) state that important elements of behavior that provides the base for learning theory situation which consist of all the objects, persons and symbols in the learning environment experience in situation prepares a person to respond to similar situation in future use of instructional materials can appeal to the individual attention by creating interest goals that will help the learner achieve direct effort. Teachers problem of motivation is essentially one of arranging situation with instructional materials on which the learner will see goals he want to attain. Brown (2005) summarized the roles of instructional materials as follows:
i. It promotes meaningful communication and effective learning.
ii. They ensure better retention, thus making learning more permanent.
iii. They help to overcome the limited classroom by making the inaccessible accessible.
iv. They provide a common experience upon which late learning can be developed. The stimulate and motivate students to learn.
v. They encourage participation especially of students are allowed to manipulated materials used.
Osuala 2010, opined that teaching does not only help to motivate and developed interest on the part of the students, but also help to bring about an enhance respect for teaching knowledge of the subject. Instructional materials are also described as concrete or bother to the sense organs during teaching (Aginna, 2000). The nature of the learning and the wide range of students abilities in the average classroom necessitate a high degree of teachers and experience in the method of presenting the subject matter. This has been truncated with the unavailability of instructional materials in school. However, a common goal a teacher carries whenever he is, is to make lesson presentation vitally fresh stimulating and testing for their students. This will help the teacher to individual the learning methods as well as the content also working according to the students need. This goal can be reached most effectively through the use of instructional materials. The need to emphasis on the use and importance of instructional materials in any learning and teaching environment cannot be under estimated. For any learning to taken place, the teacher has to make use of these materials that would enable him to teach effectively, equipments and other instructional materials to some extent determine the method the teacher uses in teaching biology. The method adopted could be demonstrated experimental, discussion etc. it is generally agreed by both teachers and schools administrator that apart from the chalkboard and textbooks which are often available for the teacher for use, there are other materials that aids or are capable of complementing their teacher’s efforts in teaching/learning process. Those materials are commonly called “instructional materials”. One of the reasons why students in our secondary schools sometimes find it difficult to comprehend immediately what is being taught by the teachers is the non availability of instructional materials that can easily convey the message if the lesson to the learners.
Orji (2000) assets that instructional materials is “the guidance of learning activities” that a “teacher uses to motivate and arouse students desire to learn”. From the foregoing statement, it can be agreed that for effective learning to take place, a student need to be properly guided by the teacher and the way employing various methods and means through which his or her teaching could be meaningful. It his however noticed regrettably, that in the Nigeria system of education, little or no instructional materials is made available. In rare cases when they are available, they are not properly utilized to achieve the most desired goal of the teacher which has to do with the academic achievement of the learners at any point in time. This noticeable problems to the best knowledge of the researcher has not been properly researched especially in owerri municipal council of Imo state, hence the decision of the researcher to embark on the current study.
Statement of the Problem
In spite of the importance of instructional materials to academic performance of students, it is observed that most students complain of being taught principles that seen to be abstract in nature. It was the Indian axion that says “What I hear, I may forget but what i hear, see and touch I may not forget” the great problem and question in Nigerian educational system us, to what extent are instructional material made available?. In cases where there are available, are there sufficient and accessible? In situation where they are sufficient are they properly utilized? Report has proved severally from the results of WAEC and NECO (2011) and other professional examination bodies on high rate of failure of students indifferent subjects especially in the sciences and this again posed many questions on the heart of proper skills and training in teaching or are instructional materials are not available enough? To what extent are teachers using the available ones? To what extent are they utilized? This on the strength of above problems and questions that the researcher deems it necessary to investigate the current study to provide solutions to whether problems that might be associated on the extent of the use of instructional materials in teaching biology in secondary schools in Owerri Municipal council of Imo state.
Lack of instructional materials make the interest of the students who study biology at all level of the study inadequacy of instructional materials and utilization that make the teaching of biology empty, creating vacuum at some stages of the teaching experience. Thus, the students are lacking or not benefiting proper information required and so they entry into the examination with little or nothing, hence they perform poorly.
Purpose of the Study
The main purpose of the study will be to investigate into the extent of the use of instructional materials in teaching and learning of biology in Owerri municipal council of Imo state. Specially, the study will seek to:
1. Determine the extent instructional materials are available for teaching of biology in secondary schools.
2. Determine the extent instructional materials will be properly utilized in the process of teaching biology in secondary school.
3. Determine the extent to which government provides instructional materials to be available and utilized to all schools at various levels.
Significance of the Study
The study has both theoretical and practical significance. Theoretically, it may provide support and insight into the current cognitive theory of teaching in schools. Here, the theory of Jean Piaget which states that learning take place in stages. Teachers can sequentially from simple to complex use instructional materials suitable for each stage of learning for the students. For the practical significance, the finding if this study will benefit the following:
· The school, students, biology teachers, government, biology textbooks writers and curriculum planners.
The school shall use the findings of this study in making decisions on making available and utilization of teaching aids in the teaching of biology in secondary schools. The reason why the result of these findings will be advantageous to the school is because the school is the centre of learning that house both the teachers, the students and other academic activities. The result if this study shall expose the student to the need of learning with instructional materials and invest more effort tin acquiring them. When need be, the students shall be exposed to the need of seeing touching and hearing practically the knowledge that is to be learnt to remove sense of abstraction. The biology teachers shall more expose the reason why they should use teaching aids in dispensing their knowledge. The teacher shall read from the result of the research the needs to employ instructional materials as it tends to reduce stress and energy spent on explanation of an abstract phenomenon. The government shall use the findings of this study to make an informed decision on the types of instructional materials to be supplied to schools at various levels, the amount of money that should be allotted to education is the budget owing to the fact that huge amount of money is required for the procurement of these instructional materials. It will also help the government to set up supervisory/monitoring team to ensure that teachers implement what has been planned in the curriculum. The authors who write books in education shall use the result of this research to a proper guide to bring in instructional materials as a veritable tool that will enhance proper understanding of what textbooks for their research to easily understand the phenomenon of interest. The curriculum planners shall greatly benefit from the findings of this research as it will help them in the planning of the curriculum on the instructional materials that should be used.
Research Questions
The following research questions will guide the study:
1. To what extent does the use of instructional material made available for teaching of biology in secondary schools?
2. To what extent do teachers have access to the instructional materials in teaching of biology in secondary schools?
3. To what extent do government provides instructional materials to be available and utilize to all schools at various levels?
Scope of the Study
This study shall cover the investigation into the extent of the use of instructional materials in teaching and learning of biology in Owerri municipal council of Imo state. The scope of this study will also examine the instructional materials used in teaching in biology classroom.
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