INNOVATIONS IN SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY AND MATHEMATICS EDUCATION IN NIGERIA, Ebele C. Okigbo, Nneka R. Nnorom, Ernest O. Onwukwe [best reads .TXT] 📗

be on individual school subject basis. Basic and all senior secondary school science subjects are yet to live up to this call: “Youth empowerment and development (is needed) to reverse the rising incidence of social ills among young people” (Abonyi & Okoli, 2009:23). Uchenna (2011:198) opined thus: “if the Federal Government is interested in arresting the deteriorating standard of the Nigerian education as to realize the vision 20-20-20, four major problem areas must be tackled. These problem areas are: Review of the theory oriented curriculum of Nigerian education from primary to the university level. The curriculum must be geared towards making our educational system more pragmatic or practically oriented…”

The very many negative notions of the Nigerian education system together with many seemingly plausible suggestions offered by the academic community must have resulted in reforms in the education industry generally and in the curricula in particular, early this century. One of such reform is the introduction of or should we say “re-introduction” of entrepreneurial education in the curriculum. This was not only done by expanding entrepreneurially-skewed content of most subject at all levels, new subjects were carved out of existing ones as Trade Subjects and made compulsory at the secondary school level. Every graduating secondary school student must offer at least one trade subject: Animal Husbandry, Fishery, Garment Making, Data Processing, Tie and Dye, to mention buta few.

Some scholars agree that the most important aim of introducing entrepreneurship education  is to “break the cycle of poverty that has ravaged the citizenry for decades  un-end”  (Onwukwe & Agommuoh, 2016). The call for educational reform has been headed to. Subjects that enhance the acquisition of entrepreneurial skills have been introduced. The consciousness of parents, teachers and students has been awakened. It is now commonly accepted that for today’s education to be relevant there is need for students to be creative, exploring and practical during the school life of the individual. However, it is disturbing that observations show that “Schools still have difficulties in offering entrepreneurial education to students due to lack of amenities and infrastructure such as workshops and basic tools” (Onwukwe & Agommuoh, 2016). Such activities are organized as methods and approaches, they will enable students to acquire the needed skills and experience need to individual contributions that when pulled together will sum up to sustained national development.

Project-based teaching and learning are highly experiential. Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (2016) shares similar notions “The core idea of project-based learning is that real-world problems capture students’ interest and provoke serious thinking as the student acquire and apply new knowledge in a problem-solving context”. Another one is Field trip method of teaching and learning. Kenna (2014) describes field trips as one such motivation to learning. “When inquiring about why teachers use field trips the answer undoubtedly always comes back to some form of students learning or motivation”. This notion is corroborated by Behrendt and Franklin (2014) when they opined that “Teachers are in a position to motivate and capture students’ interest in science. Effective methods to develop students’ interest include experiential activities and field trips…”. Field trips and project works seem to hold the promise of providing students the opportunity to acquire entrepreneurial skills. Cakici and Turkmen, (2013) point to this fulfilment on the side of the learner in projects: “…. Attitudes toward science are considered to influence future behaviors, such as interest in working on a science project”. The focus of this study was on the effects of project teaching and learning method among secondary school students as an entrepreneurial activity and hence the need to elaborate on some concepts associated with this method.

A school based project contrasts with an assignment. The purpose of both is to get the learner engaged epistemologically. While knowledge making and understanding must necessarily require time on task, assignments get done within a shorter period of time and may engage fewer of the learner’s faculties. Projects on the other hand last over a longer period of time and so engage more of the learner’s faculties. According to Pearson Education Limited (2003) a project is part of “a school or college course that involves careful study of a particular subject over a period of time”. Gill (2014) has gathered several definitions of projects including: “…a whole hearted purposeful activity proceeding in a social environment”. “A project is a bit of real life that has been imparted into school”. Project is “a voluntary undertaking which involves constructive effort or thought and eventuates into objective results”. Many professional teachers and educational personnel advocate for Project-Based-Learning (PBL) and Project-Based-Teaching (BPT). Project-Based-Learning is a student-centered pedagogy that involves a dynamic classroom approach in which students acquire a deeper knowledge through active exploration of real-world challenges and problems. Gill (2014) defines project method of teaching as “one of the modern method(s) of teaching in which, the student’s point of view is given importance in designing the curricula and content of studies”.

The basic theoretical framework for this study is the “Experiential Learning Theory” (ELT). According to Kolb, Boyatzis and Mainemelis (1999) ELT defines learning as “the process whereby knowledge is created through the transformation of experience. Knowledge results from the combination of grasping and transforming experience”. The theory is said to place emphasis on the role played by experience during knowledge making processes otherwise called learning.

The essence of projects is to enable students to gather direct experience through various faculties and learning modes. Listening to tales about an object is one experience while the sight of that object is yet another. The touch (feel) of that object is quite a different experience from manipulating that object for a specific purpose. According to the experimental learning theory, these modes of experiences afford students the opportunity to construct knowledge that is retained, related and transferred.

The project teaching method is particularly based on the “philosophy of pragmatism and the principle of learning by doing” (Gill, 2014). The project method affords the learners the opportunity to be engaged in constructive activities in natural conditions. It is inspiring because the learner is eager to see the outcome of his personal endeavors and is thereby encouraged to preserve in doing and in learning; that is constructionism (Grant, 2002).As a science and even technology-based subjects teaching strategy, projects are also said to be grounded in constructivism in the sense that the learner’s knowledge so gained is quite personal. This personal construction of knowledge enables him/her to “relate new knowledge to prior experience, or socially, through interaction with people around, such as friends, teachers, family etc.” (Cakici & Turkmen, 2013) This theoretical model corroborates the activities of students used in this study in their project work: Planning, constructing, market surveys, pricing, monitoring, and duty slot keeping were all part of participants’ experiences.

In answer to the call for curricula reforms to accommodate entrepreneurial skill acquisition, “Trade subjects” were added and made compulsory for all secondary school students. It is the responsibility of the teachers and their schools to adopt teaching strategies to meet these national goals. Onwukwe and Agommuoli (2016) opined that “science and technology education through projects and field trips bring these issues to the attention of students within a locality…” The authors proceeded to propose a system of education whereby each school is meant to adopt a particular trade subject through which her graduates acquire specific entrepreneurial skills. A number of options were marshaled out for schools to choose from including Animal husbandry. Many authors are of the opinion that projects enhance students’ performance in many areas of their development. The approach itself incorporates other approaches and methods making learning more in-dept. Muriithi, Odundo, Origa and Gatumu (2013) believe that project approach to teaching combine for effectiveness with the lecture method. The authors describe the project approach as a “teacher-facilitated collaborative approach”. This agrees with views of Roessingh and Chambers (2011) who described the instruction mode in projects as mediated and integrated, affording the students the opportunity to develop critical reflection and higher-order thinking skills.

Critics of group project method of teaching and learning have some reservations. Grant (2002) for instance, observes that “students that are inexperienced with working in groups may have difficulties negotiating compromise”. This is what teachers may look out for while designing projects and grouping of students. Some critics are concerned with the time required to implement the strategy. “This method takes a lot of time to plan and execute a single project” (Gill, 2014). The author equally observed that it is not that easy to design a different project for different topics neither is it possible to use a single project to cover the content of a single topic. Not every teacher is gifted, creative and constructive enough to make the best of projects for students’ benefits. Yet other critics have equally looked at the influence of more active students on others in constructivist teaching techniques as exemplified by school-based group project works. This leads to slacking off or sitting back to let others to do project work. Some have even been so harsh as to describe the teaching and learning models pedestal led on active learning as “educational disaster” because physical activity does not equate to cognitive activity or learning

Notwithstanding these criticisms some empirical studies record some successes in the applications of entrepreneurial projects in secondary school teaching and learning of science and technology subjects. For instance, Muriithi, Odundo, Origa and Gatumu (2013) studied project method and linear achievement in physics in Keyan secondary schools. Quasi-experimental design was used. Eighty-four schools were sampled and all physics teachers in the schools participated in the study. Data collected was student’s achievement scores in physics. The analysis showed a significant difference in achievement of students exposed to projects when compared to those who were not.

 

Statement of the Problem

The present researchers believe that curriculum reform is one thing and its implementation yet another. One of the ways to make science and technology education come alive in the classroom is to let the learners get engaged through activities. This bridges the gap between theory and practice. The teacher may have the curriculum and its prescriptions handy and may be docile and let the status quo continue. In the senior secondary, learning through project activities is envisioned by academics as motivator to not only skill acquisition but also to understanding the relationships between knowledge, products and solutions to practical problems. This is a kind of reinforcement that helps learners to explore phenomena in their natural environment and put into practice what they study in the area of science and technology (Nnachi, 2010). Since curricula in science and technology have been reformed, science and trade subjects are now offered in secondary schools. Will effectively engaging students in projects enhance achievements and enrolment in science and technology subjects?

Purpose of the Study

The purpose of this study was to find out the effects projects as entrepreneurial activities have on achievements of Secondary School Students in Science and technology subjects. In detail, however, the study aimed at finding out the following:

Comparative achievements of Senior Secondary School students in the trade subject of Animal Husbandry with specific projects and those who did not have specific projects.

Effect of multiple projects on students’ achievements in the trade subject of Animal Husbandry.

The enrolment of male and female senior secondary school students in Animal Husbandry as the number of specific projects increased overtime.

Hypotheses

Three null hypotheses were tested in this study were tested at 0.05 level of significance.

HO1: There is no significant difference in the mean achievement scores in animal husbandry of SS2 students who carried out specific projects and those who did not.

HO2: There is no significance difference in the mean achievement scores in animal husbandry of SS2 students who carried out three, two and one specific projects during the session.

HO3: There is no significance difference in the enrolment figures of male and female SS2 students in animal husbandry when one, two and three specific projects are provided for the class during a session.

Method

In this study, quasi-experimental design was adopted. It was a pre-test-post-test, intact (non-randomized) classes