No abstract

Research findings in secondary schools have consistently indicated that geometry is one of the most difficult areas of Mathematics at basic level and students’ attitude towards it has been a factor that is known to influence students’ achievement in mathematics. The purpose of this study is to investigate the level of students’ attitude towards geometry and to find out whether gender difference influences such attitude. Some selected secondary schools in Zamfara state were used for the study. The study adopted a descriptive survey design using a questionnaire tagged Geometric Attitude Questionnaire. The population of the study consisted of SS I students in Zamfara state. A sample of 157students was drawn using simple random sampling technique. Descriptive statistics of means and standard deviations were used to answer the research questions while Inferential Statistics of the Mann-Whitney test was used to test the formulated hypothesis. The study revealed that students’ attitude towards geometry was relatively high generally, with male students having much higher positive attitude to geometry than their female counterparts and that difference between them was not statistically significant at α = 0.05 level of significance. It is recommended that teachers should be resourceful in encouraging and helping students in order to build positive attitude by trying to relate geometry to real life situations and also be gender sensitive.

The study sought to find out the relative effect of curriculum and item-teaching techniques on students’ conceptual understanding in heat and vapours in senior secondary school in Zamfara State. Three research questions and three null hypotheses guided the study. The study adopted a quasi-experimental research design, precisely non-equivalent control group design. Simple random and Purposive sampling techniques were used to select a sample of 157 SS2 physics students for the study. Thermal Conceptual and Traditional Physics Exercises (TCTPE), which has twenty (20) items, was used to collect data for the study. Three experts in Department of Science Education, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, validated the instrument. Two reliability estimates confirmed the reliability of the instrument (TCTPE). The first tested the temporal stability and the second, the internal consistency of the TCTPE. The estimated values of 0.76 and 0.82 were obtained. The data obtained for the study were analyzed using frequencies, percentages, mean and standard deviation. Also, Analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) and Chi-square were used to test the null hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. Findings of the study revealed that item-teaching technique increase students’ achievement (or test) score in Traditional Physics Exercises in Heat and Vapour. However, there is no statistically significant difference in the mean achievement score of students given traditional physics exercises in heat and vapours under curriculum and item-teaching techniques. Meanwhile, students under curriculum teaching techniques had higher Conceptual Understanding mean score in heat and vapours, compared to their counterpart under item-teaching techniques. Finally, it was revealed that majority of students under curriculum teaching techniques were on scientific/conceptual understanding level, compared to their counterpart under item-teaching techniques where a very small number of students were on Scientific/Conceptual Understanding level. The study therefore, recommends that Physics teachers should teach to the curriculum for scientific/conceptual understanding of Senior Secondary School Students.

The study focused on the use of instructional materials for effective teaching and learning of mathematics at upper Basic Education Level. The use of shapes was employed to introduce the teaching of algebra to upper Basic Education Junior Secondary School One (JSSI) students. Quasi-experimental (Pre-test Post-test Non-equivalent control group design) was used for the study. The instrument use for the study was Algebraic Performance and Retention Test (APRT). The Performance Test was used as Pre-test, Pre-test and Retention-test. Researchers self-constructed two-dimensional shapes were used as manipulative skills for the teaching and learning of algebra. Two intact classrooms of JSSI were randomly selected out of the private schools in Gusau metropolis. Mode of instruction was randomly assigned to the classes using simple random technique of balloting. A sample size of 180 students were involved in the study comprising of 90 for experimental and 90 for control groups. The teaching and scoring were made by the researchers while the items, lesson plan and marking guide were all validated by the experts in mathematics education from the Federal University, Gusau. The findings of the study show that students taught algebra using manipulating skill performed better than those taught using conventional method. Also, students in the manipulative group retained the algebra contents more than those in the conventional group. More so, there was no significant difference in the mean achievement scores of male and female student’s algebra for both teaching methods. Similarly, there was no significant difference in the mean retention scores of male and female students in algebra for both teaching methods.