EFFECT OF BIOLOGY PRACTICAL ON THE ACHIEVEMENT OF SENIOR SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS IN BIOLOGY IN QUA'AN PAN LOCAL GOVERNMENT AREA OF PLATEAU STATE
Keywords:
Biology practical, achievementAbstract
This study investigated the effect of Biology practical on the academic achievement of Senior Secondary School biology students in Qua'an Pan Local Government Area of Plateau State. The study adopted pre-test and post-test non randomized quasi experimental design. Three research questions and three hypotheses guided the study. One hundred (100) Senior Secondary School students were sampled from the population of 490 SS 2 students. Two schools were sampled out of twelve (12) Government Secondary Schools in Qua'an Pan L.G.A, whereby school A is the control group and school B is the experimental group. Instrument for data collection was Biology Achievement Test (BAT) consisting of eight (8) multiple -choice test and two essay items was constructed. The instrument was validated by three Experts, one in measurement and evaluation and two in biology education. The reliability test was done using Cronbach Alpha method to determine the reliability. The reliability obtained was 0.71. The research questions were answered using mean and standard deviation while hypothesis were tested using t-test. The findings of the study showed that students taught biology using practical activities performed better than their counterparts using conventional method. The result also showed that gender has significant difference on student's performance when taught with practical. The researcher therefore, recommends that teachers should employ practical activities in teaching biology to enhance student`s performance.