Akpevweoghene Anthony OMOVIE’s scientific contributions

This study was conducted to investigate the effect of inquiry and lecture methods on secondary school students’ achievement in Biology. Two research questions and two hypotheses were formulated to guide the study. The study adopted quasi-experimental pre-test, post-test, control group research design. Three hundred and twenty (320) Biology senior secondary school one students from nine (9) selected sampled schools in Delta Central Senatorial District were used as research sample. The simple random sampling technique was used to select the sampled schools. The experimental group was exposed to inquiry method while the control group was taught with lecture method. Biology Achievement Test (BAT) was used to collect data for both pre-test and post-test. A reliability coefficient of 0.77 was obtained using Kuder-Richardson Formula 21. Data collected was analyzed using statistics of mean and standard deviation to answer the research questions and t-test and analysis of variance (ANOVA) to test the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The results showed that there was significant difference in the achievement of students instructed using the inquiry and the lecture method in favour of inquiry method; there was no significant difference in the achievement of male and female students instructed using the inquiry and the lecture methods. It was concluded that inquiry and lecture methods of teaching enhance students’ achievements Biology but inquiry method was more effective for the improvement of Biology students’ achievements. Based on this, recommendations were made.

This study examined the effects of discussion and inquiry methods on secondary school students’ scholarly performance in Biology. The study adopted quasi-experimental pre-test, post-test, control group research design. Three hundred and eighty (380) secondary school one Biology students from nine schools through the simple random sampling technique were used as the research sample. The control group were instructed employing the lecture method, while the experimental group participated using the inquiry method. Both groups were instructed with same biological concepts in intact classroom for six weeks. Biology Achievement Test (BAT) was administered to collect data for pre-test and post-test. A reliability coefficient of 0.76 was obtained using kuder-Richardson Formula 21. The data collected were analysed using the statistics of mean to answer the research questions and t-test and analysis of variance (ANOVA) to test the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The study’s findings indicated a significant difference in the scholarly performance of male and female students instructed using discussion and inquiry methods, with the former yielding better results; and a significant difference in the scholarly performance of discussion- and inquiry-based instruction when it came to student gender. In conclusion, both discussion and inquiry methods of teaching help Biology students do better in high school, but the discussion method works better than the inquiry method. Based on these, recommendations were made.

This study investigated the effects of inquiry and discussion methods on secondary school Biology students’ achievement and attitudes in Delta Central Senatorial District. The study adopted pre-test post-test control group quasi-experimental design. The population of the study consisted of 17,790 senior secondary school one (SS1) Biology students in public secondary schools in Delta Central Senatorial District. A sample size of 418 SS1 Biology students in 9 public mixed secondary schools was used for the study. The instruments used for collection of data were: Biology Achievement Test (BAT) and Biology Student Attitude Scale (BSAS). The reliability of BAT and BSAS were established using Kuder-Richardson Formula 21 and Cronbach Alpha which yielded 0.77 and 0.78 reliability coefficient respectively. The data collected using BAT and BSAS were analyzed using mean, standard deviation, t-test and analysis of variance (ANOVA). The results showed that there was significant difference in the mean achievement scores of secondary school Biology students taught with inquiry and discussion methods, in favour of discussion method; there was no significant difference in the mean attitude scores of secondary school Biology students taught with inquiry and discussion methods. It was concluded that inquiry, discussion and lecture method of teaching enhance secondary Biology students’ achievement but at varying degree; and inquiry and discussion methods of teaching improve secondary school Biology students’ attitudes more than lecture method of teaching. However, discussion method of teaching has more effect compared to inquiry and lecture method of teaching. Based on these findings, recommendations were made.