Teacher Competencies and Instructional Strategies Utilization for Skill Acquisition of Business Education Students in Nigeria

Abstract

The study examined the extent of the influence of teacher competencies and instructional strategies utilization for skill acquisition of office technology and management students in polytechnics in South-Western Nigeria. The study adopted descriptive survey design. Two research questions guided the study and two null hypotheses were tested at 0.05 level of significance. The population of the study consisted of 152 lecturers and instructors in all the accredited polytechnics in South-Western Nigeria. There was no sampling since the population was manageable. The data for the study was collected through questionnaire which was duly validated by three experts. With the use of Cronbach Alpha Reliability Test (CART), the reliability co-efficient calculated for the study was found to be 0.868 which indicated that the instrument for the study was reliable. Mean and standard deviation were the tools used to analyze the research questions while the hypotheses were tested using independent t-test statistics at 0.05 level of significance. The study found that teaching competencies has positive influence on skill acquisition among OTM students in polytechnics to a great extent. Based on these findings, it was concluded that lecturers are competent in teaching relevant skills to the students in polytechnics. It was therefore, recommended, among others, that the Lecturers should be trained and retrained in order to keep them abreast and competent with the current trends in curriculum and instruction of OTM courses and for effective service delivery.

The Need for Competencies Required by Vocational and Technical Educators for Quality of Job Performance in Technical Vocational Education

“…The finding is also in agreement with Emeasoba and Ezenwafor (2014) who maintained that teaching competencies has positive influence on skill acquisition. The finding of the present study is however in dissonance with the findings of Umoru and Shaibu (2018) which revealed that instructors do not necessarily require teaching competencies for their job performance.…”

“…Jim and Okafor (2015) further stated that vocational educators need cash management skill to a high extent to manage available cash effectively, and effectively to teach their students. The findings of the present study also corroborates with the findings in the study of Umoru and Shaibu (2018) who reported that vocational educators' competencies in instructional technologies is not influenced by gender, but instructional technology competence has significant influence on skill acquisition among OTM students.…”