By Dalong, OM; Olakunle, FJ (2024). Greener Journal of Education and Training Studies, 7(1), 9-15
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Vol. 7(1), pp. 9-15, 2024
ISSN: 2276-7789
Copyright ©2024, the copyright of this article is retained by the author(s)
https://gjournals.org/GJETS
DOI: https://doi.org/10.15580/GJETS.2024.1.092424116
Tetfund Centre of Excellence for Innovative Teaching and Learning in Primary and Early Childhood Education (T-CEIPEC). Federal College of Education, Pankshin.
Type: Research
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DOI: 10.15580/GJETS.2024.1.092424116
The study examined the baseline survey on the numeracy knowledge of primary pupils in plateau central zone, Nigeria. Three research questions and two hypotheses guided the study with the use of exploratory research design. The population consisted of numeracy teachers and primary five pupils in public primary schools within the state central zone. The sampled schools and classes were purposively selected from five towns heading the local government area within the central zone of the state. The sample size were five (5) numeracy teachers teaching primary five pupils in the selected schools and 100 pupils under the respective numeracy teachers were selected randomly. The instruments for data collection were; Teachers Numeracy Teaching Methods Observation checklist (TNTMOC), Pupils Numeracy Knowledge Test (PNKT), Pupils Interest/attitude to Numeracy knowledge Checklist (PINKC). The instruments were validated using content validity by experts. The instruments had reliability indices of 0.70, 0.76 and 0.78 respectively. However, a standardized unified pupil’s numeracy performance test by the State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB) was used to determine pupil’s numeracy knowledge. Data were analysed using mean and standard deviation, while one tailed t-test statistics was used for hypotheses testing at 0.05 level of significance. The findings revealed that the teachers’ teaching strategies and pupils’ interest/attitude causes the decline in numeracy knowledge among public primary school pupils. The hypothesis revealed a significant difference in the pupil’s numeracy knowledge against expected passed level set in the study. Therefore, it was recommended that teachers need to be trained in the use of effective teaching strategies and learning materials to enhance and engage pupils’ interest/attitude constantlyin numeracy skills.
Published: 09/10/2024
Falade Job Olakunle
E-mail: falade.olakunle@ yahoo.com; dalongobadiah@ yahoo.com
The target of every educational system is to ensure that students achieve a satisfactory outcome in whatever they are taught based on the curriculum contents and as well to be able to solve subsequent problems in real life situation. Education is therefore, an act of acquiring knowledge through teaching and learning process of principles and practices that enhanced development. However, the contents of educational process are usually measured to know the extent to which the knowledge is acquired through performance/achievement test. Academic performance is one of the major variables that measure an individual’s success or failure in school system (Adikwu & Chibabi, 2018). Academic performance, though measured in different forms, has the tendency of revealing the individual knowledge and quality of education received by the respective learner.
Quality education supposed to provide solution to societal problems and if any difference, it has not possessed the desire quality. The global monitoring report for quality education in Battista 2014 indicates that the quality of learning among children in sub-Saharan Africa is quite low, so there is need to provide quality teaching and learning to make citizens of these nations compete favourably with their counterparts from other nations in the 21st century. Bold et al in Evans and Acosta (2020) in a recent evidences across seven countries in Sub-Sharan Africa found that, in third grade, less than two in three children could read letter and only about half of the children could read a word or put numbers in order This low quality of learning as observed has been credited to be diminishing teachers quality and impacting teaching quality, students’ learning outcome via attitudes/interest, unavailability of learning materials among others (Manrique2020, Karue & Amukowa, 2013; Tshabalala & Ncube, 2013).
Nigeria precisely needs functional and quality education that can engineer her citizens towards achieving complex skills for further schooling, responsible citizenship, international competitiveness and lifelong learning. This functional education can only be achieved through effective and innovative teaching and learning process at all level of educational system (Akanwa, et al., 2019). Importantly, teachers must be able to create an environment to offer quality learning for all student. Hence, innovative teaching and learning are needed, to tackle poor quality education by addressing the rate of poor performance in schools especially in numeracy knowledge. There is no subject or field of study that does not make use of some forms of numeracy knowledge (Abdullahi, 2017). Knowledge of numeracy in an individual life cannot be ignored as no one ever lived without numeracy. Hence, numeracy is important in some ways such as: working out number of minutes to accomplish a task, increasing a recipe to serve extra guests, checking if we have received the right change, working out how much to tip in a restaurant, setting and keeping to a budget, helping children with homework, managing our diet and nutrition, measuring medicine doses, making sense of statistics and graphs in the news. Therefore, numeracy is the effective use of numbers to meet the general demands of life at home, in paid work, and for participation in community and civic life. Falade, Dalong and Gyot (2020) see numeracy as the ability to understand and work with numbers which involves the ability to apply simple numerical concepts and comprehending fundamental arithmetic like addition, subtraction, multiplication and division.
Numeracy skill is required in all academic programmes, despite the importance of mathematics; many problems seem to beset mathematics education in Nigeria. These problems have resulted in the consistent poor or decline performance in numeracy by many people. However, this declining state of numeracy knowledge is attributed to a number of factors such as attitude/interest of pupils (Adikwu & Chibabi, 2018); lack of instructional resources (Yara & Otieno, 2010); instructional techniques (Olulonye, 2010), among others. Pupils’ academic achievement and interest level have not been encouraging over the years as revealed among primary schools’ graduates in the state. This justifies the need for this baseline assessment of numeracy knowledge and the causes of the persistent poor performance in numeracy.
Researches have established that student at post primary education levels performed poorly in numerical tasks and this was traced to poor background in numeracy knowledge from their primary level (Oyinloye & Popoola, 2013). Similarly, at primary school level is also found that, pupils performed very poor and have low competencies in Numeracy, literacy and as well as Life skills (Ikoro & Eleri 2017). Many reasons can be traced to this poor and low performance. The pupils’ interests and attitudes towards numeracy and poor teaching strategies. Sometime, the pupils were not well exposed to numeracy properly through variety of methods and learning innovation that can stimulate their interest and attitude, this has further created gap which are now difficult to be addressed as the pupils advanced in life and educational career. Popoola (2014), stated that children ought to be helped early enough to develop positive attitude towards numeracy because they will need to build their future academic attainments especially in Mathematics based on the knowledge acquired during the primary school years.
Despite that the decline is identified as a problem, there is scanty record and statistics on the extent of the poor performance in numeracy knowledge in primary schools in the state. Also, little has been done on a substantive reason that causes the persistent poor performance of the pupils at that level of education. Hence, this justifies the reason for baseline study to ascertain the level of the primary school pupil’s numeracy knowledge in plateau state central senatorial district. Examine the pupils’ interest and attitude visa vis the teaching strategies employed by the teachers in the teaching and learning of numeracy in the classrooms.
Research questions
What is the level of numeracy knowledge acquired by public primary school pupils in Central Senatorial District of Plateau State?
How effective is the teaching methods being used in the learning of numeracy among public primary pupils in Central Senatorial District of Plateau State?
To what extent is the learners’ interest/attitude in the teaching and learning of numeracy in public primary schools?
Statement of hypothesis
There is no significant difference in the numeracy knowledge acquired by the pupils when compared with expected standard knowledge
There is no significant difference between the teachers’ teaching methods/strategies and pupils’ interest/attitude to teaching and learning of numeracy as observed in public primary schools
The study used exploratory design. The design was appropriate as the researchers explored through a baseline assessment of pupil’s numeracy knowledge, the dominant teaching method(s) teachers used in numeracy lesson delivery and pupils’ interest/attitude towards numeracy lesson delivery in the classroom across the primary schools under consideration in Plateau State Central Senatorial District. The population for the study consists of all numeracy teachers teaching at primary five (5) levels and pupils in public primary schools in the entire town heading the local government within zone. The primary five teachers and pupils were selected purposively based on the fact that at that level pupils have had basic numeracy knowledge. The zone had five local government areas and five town as the Local Government Headquarters. The sampled schools were purposively selected based on the centrality of those schools in all the five towns heading the local government areas within the zone. Hence, the sample size were five (5) teachers teaching numeracy at the primary five(5) level of the selected schools and a total of 100 pupils randomly selected under the respective numeracy teachers. The data collection tools were Teachers Numeracy Teaching Methods Observation checklist (TNTMOC), Pupils Numeracy knowledge Test (PNKT), Pupils Interest/attitude to Numeracy knowledge Checklist (PINKC) were used. The checklists were used to obtain information regarding the teaching methods and strategies teachers used in the teaching and learning as well as pupils’ interest and attitude towards numeracy while the numeracy achievement test was conducted to ascertain pupils’ numeracy knowledge. However, a standardized unified pupil’s numeracy performance test developed by the State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB) was used to obtain pupils performance in numeracy. The performance test, was based on the pass mark of eight (8) out of twenty questions. Hence, eight was used as the expected mean for all the schools used for the study. The data collected were analysed using both descriptive and inferential statistics. Specifically, mean, standard deviation and t-test statistics were used at 0.05 significant level. Also, a 2.50 decision point was used to accept or reject the observational checklist items.
Research Question One
What is the level of numeracy knowledge acquired by primary five pupils in public schools, Central Senatorial District of Plateau State?
Table 1: Mean Scores of Levels of Numeracy Knowledge acquired by Primary Five Pupils in Public Schools Central Senatorial District of Plateau State
The table1 presents the mean performance of the pupils in numeracy knowledge acquired by primary five pupils in the study area. The result revealed 7.10 as the highest mean obtained while 4.86 was the lowest from a total of twenty question items. The test value of 8 was used to determine those that passed based on the average obtained. This implies that none of the schools obtain an average above the test value, this indicating low performance of the pupils in numeracy test.
Research Question Two
Table 2: Observation Mean of the Effectiveness of Teachers Numeracy Teaching Methods
The table 2 presents the mean of the observed effectiveness of teachers teaching methods/strategies in teaching-learning of numeracy. Ten (10) items were presented all the items were rejected based on the observation made. The overall mean obtained was 1.71 indicating low effectiveness in teachers’ teaching methods/strategies during the teaching-learning of numeracy. This implies that the teachers’ teaching method/strategies are not effective to improve pupils’ numeracy skills and is one of the factors affecting pupils learning of numeracy in the classroom.
Research Question Three
Table 3: Mean of the Pupils Interest/Attitude rating towards Teaching and Learning of Numeracy
Pupils are confident and trying different ways in solving numeracy problems
The table 3 presents mean of the primary five pupils’ interest/attitude rating towards learning of numeracy in the classroom. Ten items were rated regarding pupils’ interest/attitude towards learning numeracy knowledge. All the observed scale items were rejected except one, these revealed that pupils interested/attitude towards learning of numeracy rated very low. Also, the low interest in numeracy learning affects their concentration and adequate learning of numeracy. The only item observed and rated rarely was pupils sometimes sees making mistake when solving numeracy as discouraging. The overall mean of the observation was 1.61, indicating that pupil’s interest/attitude towards the learning of numeracy skills was very low.
Testing of the Hypothesis
Hypothesis One
There is no significant difference between the expected mean and the mean of the numeracy knowledge acquired by the primary five pupils in public primary schools, central senatorial district of plateau state
Table 4: One-Tailed Test of Significant Difference between the Expected Mean and the Mean of the Numeracy Test Knowledge
The table 4 presents the one-tailed t-test result on the significant difference between primary five pupils’ numeracy performance test based compared to the expected mean test value of eight (8). The hypothesis was rejected since the p-values for the selected primary school’s pupil’s numeracy performance test was less than the 0.05 significance level. Therefore, there is a significance difference in the pupil’s performance in the numeracy test based on the test values of eight (8). This implies that numeracy knowledge acquired by the pupils based on the baseline information were considered very low and among factors causes the decline or low numeracy knowledge as observed in this study are: teaching method/strategies and pupils’ interest/attitude to learning of numeracy concepts.
Hypothesis Two
There is no significant difference between the teachers’ teaching methods/strategies and pupils’ interest/attitude to teaching and learning of numeracy as observed in public primary schools.
Table 5: Two-tailed Test result on Teachers Teaching Methods and Pupils Interest/Attitude to Numeracy knowledge in Public Primary Schools
The table 5 presents significant difference between the observed teachers teaching methods/strategies and pupils interest/attitude towards teaching and learning of numeracy as observed in the study. The hypothesis was accepted since the p-values 0f 0.519 obtained, was greater than the 0.05 significance level. Therefore, it was concluded that there is no significant difference between teachers teaching method/strategies and pupils interest/attitude to teaching and learning of numeracy. This implies that there is teachers’ teaching methods and pupils interest/attitude has impacted the learning of numeracy among public primary schools’ pupils in the state.
The research question one revealed the baseline numeracy knowledge among public primary schools’ pupils in the study area based on their performance in the numeracy test. The hypothesis tested further established that a significance difference exists in the pupil’s performance in numeracy test compare to the expected test values of eight (8)set as passed mark out of 20 marks. The result revealed that, numeracy knowledge acquired by the pupils were below the expected average passed mark specified in the study. This is supported by Manrique (2020) who identified there is low quality of learning and knowledge and is impacting students learning outcomes, Battista (2014) who found the quality of learning among children in sub-Saharan Africa is quite low and Popoola (2014), who found that pupils ought to be helped early enough to develop positive attitude towards numeracy as there were decline in performance.
The research question two examine effectiveness of teachers teaching methods/strategies being employed in teaching and learning of numeracy concepts. The result revealed that, teachers’ teaching method/strategies are not highly effective to improve pupils’ numeracy skills and is a contributing factors affecting pupils learning of numeracy in the classroom. The result is in accordance with Adikwu and Chibabi (2018), and Olulonye (2010) who attributed the declining in numeracy achievement to instructional techniques, and interest/attitude of the pupils. The implication is that, the ineffectiveness of teachers teaching methods/strategies have resulted to this persistent low performance and low quality of learning of numeracy among primary schools’ pupils. The finding also, agrees with Battista (2014), (Karue and Amukowa, 2013; Tshabalala & Ncube, 2013), that the quality of learning among children in sub-Saharan Africa is quite low so there is need to provide quality teaching and learning to make citizens of these nations compete favourably with their counterparts from other nations in the 21st century.
The research question three revealed low level of pupil’s interest/attitude towards learning of numeracy this was in agreement with Adikwu and Chibabi (2018) who attributed the declining in numeracy knowledge to be pupil’s interest/attitude. The hypothesis two further established that, there is no significant difference between the teachers’ teaching methods/strategies and pupils’ interest/attitude to teaching and learning of numeracy in public primary schools. The evidence of this is that ineffectiveness observed in teachers teaching methods/strategies attributed to pupils’ low interest/attitude towards teaching and learning of numeracy in the study.
In conclusion, the study showed that there is a decline in pupils numeracy knowledge in the study area and teachers’ teaching strategies and pupils’ interest/attitude are attributed causes of the decline in numeracy knowledge. The baseline numeracy knowledge test further revealed a wide gap as against the expected outcome with a significant difference in the pupil’s performance in numeracy test. In addition, the results show that pupils have negative interest/attitude towards mathematics.
Based on the findings and conclusion drawn from the study, the following recommendations were made:
Teachers need to be trained in the use of appropriate and innovative teaching methods/strategies as well as adequate provision of teaching-learning materials to facilitate numeracy teaching-learning process effectively.
Government should organize seminars and workshops for mathematics teachers on innovative teaching methods to improve pupils’ numeracy performance.
Teachers should explicitly teach new knowledge, concepts and skills in multiple ways to connect new and existing knowledge in numeracy this will enhance pupils’ interest which in turn re-direct their attitude towards numeracy learning.
Appreciation to Tetfund Centre of Excellence for Innovative Teaching and Learning in Primary and Early Childhood Education (T-CEIPEC). Federal College of Education, Pankshin, as the researchers leverage on one of their activities to collect data for this study.
The authors declared that there is no conflict of interest in the research work.
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