Culturally-relevant pedagogy and students' preferences over online teaching/learning modalities in sub-Saharan African Universities: A case of the University of Abomey-Calavi

Abstract

This study assessed the responsiveness of the online learning techno-pedagogical materials to the students’ cultural and socio-economic conditions at Abomey-Calavi University through a student-centered lens. The study used the multi-stage sampling procedure to select 360 students from four professional training programs that have rich experience in online learning/teaching. Descriptive statistics and a logit model were deployed to analyze collected data. The results displayed that though there were diverse ethnic groups among surveyed students, the majority of them were of the Benin nationality (98.3%) against only (1.7%) who were from neighboring countries. The mean age of the students was 20.35 years with less than one-quarter (24.2%) having a full scholarship, 12.8%, and 63.1% having half scholarship and financial support from their parents or relatives, respectively. More than half (57.8%) of the respondents preferred mixed classrooms while the overwhelming majority (84.4%) preferred asynchronized over synchronized interventions for teachers and learners. More than half of the respondents (56.7%) mentioned that lecturers do not practice ethnics-based discrimination during their classes against 10.8% who indicated that they did and 32.5% who did not know. Furthermore, when students were asked to rank 5 items that contribute to a smooth condition for online classrooms, students mentioned in priority order the five items as follows: Smartphone ownership, equipped lecture rooms, connexion data support for students, open connexion points establishment on campus, and finally, laptop ownership. Results from the econometric regression revealed that the key drivers that were likely to shape students’ preference over online or in-person classroom modalities, were age, experience in 2020 government-supported online classes, Smartphone or laptop ownership, no scholarship, and no connexion support to students. Therefore, the study suggested policies that create enabling conditions for students to attend online teaching or learning, especially by providing students with data for connexion and other necessary internet assets.