Motivational Strategies and Students’ Academic Performance in Geography Among SS3 Students of Dutse Senior Secondary School, Jigawa State.
CHAPTER ONE
OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY
The aim of this study is to examine Motivational strategies and students’ academic performance in geography among SS 3 students.
The specific objectives are to
- Examine the importance of motivation in classroom learning.
- Explain the factors influencing student’s motivation.
- Suggest the strategies by which teachers can improve student’s motivation
- To ascertain the effect of motivational strategies on student academic performance on geography
CHAPTER TWO
REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE
Conceptual Framework
The conceptual framework for this study is based on cooperative learning strategy and academic performance. Cooperative learning strategy is an instructional strategy where students are grouped into 2-5 members per group for the purpose of learning. The strategy is based on group learning but unlike other forms of group learning, CLS assigns the students to group of two to five members. Hence it is based on small group learning. The term cooperative learning, according to Slavin (1986), refers to a variety of instructional strategies in which teachers encourage students to cooperate in learning. Johnson, Johnson and Smith (2007), defined cooperative learning as students working in groups where they are expected to help each other find answers to their questions rather than seeking answers from the instructor. Cooperative learning strategy can be seen as instructional strategy which encourages interactive learning in which students, in small group, cooperatively construct new knowledge. Academic performance on the other hand, denotes the outcome of students‘ academic activities in form of grades or scores received at the end of specified period of time. Academic performance refers to measure of student‘s performance from a given learning task. Viewed this way, academic performance can be good or poor. Concern about poor academic performance has risen especially when students‘ results are released by the various examination bodies such as WAEC and NECO (Ofili, 2012). The extent to which students perform brilliantly in standardized tests and teacher-made test is used as parameter for measuring their level of academic performance and the effectiveness of the system. To this end, Philias and Wanjobi ( 2011), asserted that the better the performance of the students, the more effective the system is assumed to be.
Theoretical Framework
Cooperative learning strategy as an instructional strategy has overwhelming theoretical supports which justify its wide prevalence and acceptance in different subject areas. Modern theories of learning emphasize the important role played by the learners in the learning process. One of such theories is Constructivist Theory proposed by Bruner (1960). Constructivism is a learning theory founded on the idea that students construct knowledge in the process of learning through interaction with the phenomenon, as they develop sharedmeaning of the phenomenon within social context (Geer & Rudge, 2013). The underlying premise of constructivist learning theory is that learning is an active process in which learners are active sense-makers who seek to build coherent and organized knowledge (Mayer, 2013). Learning become meaningful only after the new materials are well connected with existing related knowledge or schema. To constructivist, an individual can only learn if his/her conceptual schema provides the framework upon which to fit new knowledge (Erinosho, 2008). Learning conflict occur when there is contradiction between the existing schema and the new ideas, forcing the learner to consider whether to reject the new idea or discard the 20 old.
CHAPTER THREE
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
Research design
The researcher used descriptive research survey design in building up this project work the choice of this research design was considered appropriate because of its advantages of identifying attributes of a large population from a group of individuals. The design was suitable for the study as the study sought to Motivational strategies and students’ academic performance in geography among SS3 students of Dutse senior secondary school, Jigawa state.
Sources of data collection
Data were collected from two main sources namely:
Primary source and Secondary source
Primary source:
These are materials of statistical investigation which were collected by the research for a particular purpose. They can be obtained through a survey, observation questionnaire or as experiment; the researcher has adopted the questionnaire method for this study.
Secondary source:
These are data from textbook Journal handset etc. they arise as byproducts of the same other purposes. Example administration, various other unpublished works and write ups were also used.
CHAPTER FOUR
PRESENTATION ANALYSIS INTERPRETATION OF DATA
Introduction
Efforts will be made at this stage to present, analyze and interpret the data collected during the field survey. This presentation will be based on the responses from the completed questionnaires. The result of this exercise will be summarized in tabular forms for easy references and analysis. It will also show answers to questions relating to the research questions for this research study. The researcher employed simple percentage in the analysis.
CHAPTER FIVE
SUMMARY, CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION
Introduction
It is important to ascertain that the objective of this study was to ascertain Motivational strategies and students’ academic performance in geography among SS3 students of Dutse senior secondary school, Jigawa state. In the preceding chapter, the relevant data collected for this study were presented, critically analyzed and appropriate interpretation given. In this chapter, certain recommendations made which in the opinion of the researcher will be of benefits in addressing the challenges of Motivational strategies and students’ academic performance in geography among SS3 students
Summary
This study was on Motivational strategies and students’ academic performance in geography among SS3 students of Dutse senior secondary school, Jigawa state. Four objectives were raised which included: Examine the importance of motivation in classroom learning, explain the factors influencing student’s motivation, Suggest the strategies by which teachers can improve student’s motivation and to ascertain the effect of motivational strategies on student academic performance on geography. In line with these objectives, two research hypotheses were formulated and two null hypotheses were posited. The total population for the study is 200 staff of selected secondary schools, Jigawa state. The researcher used questionnaires as the instrument for the data collection. Descriptive Survey research design was adopted for this study. A total of 133 respondents made principals, teachers, senior staffs and senior staff men were used for the study. The data collected were presented in tables and analyzed using simple percentages and frequencies
Conclusion
The motivational strategies have a strong record of successes in increasing student‘s motivation to learn and enhancing higher academic performance. Students exposed to motivational in the present study performed significantly better than those taught geography by means of traditional lecture method. The strategy was found to be gender-friendly as the result from the test of hypothesis indicated that differences do not exist between the performance of male and female students who learnt geography by means of motivational. This strategy can be used to address the present trend of poor academic performance of senior secondary school students in geography. Geography teachers at senior secondary level can explore the potential of motivational in order to improve the teaching and learning of geography irrespective of major area of the subject
Recommendation
Senior secondary schools in the rural areas should be equipped with basic school facilities that facilitate learning of geography by the government to enable the students benefit from the use of motivation at this level.
In view of the apparent failure of students particularly in the area of practical, motivation should be used to address the unique trend of poor academic performance of students in practical geography/map reading.
Considering the fact that physical geography has been considered by many students as conceptually difficult area, geography teachers should emphasize the use of motivation to teach aspects of physical geography so as to improve the performance of their students.
References
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