The Effect Of Concept Mapping On Students’ Achievement In Biology In Senior Secondary Schools In Aba Educational Zone Of Abia State

This study investigated the effects of concept mapping on students’ achievement in Biology. The study was guided by three research questions and three hypotheses using pretest and posttest design. The population of the study was made up of ten thousand and forty five students (10,045) in Senior secondary school class two (2), in the (2015/2016) academic session in Aba Educational zone, Abia state. The sample consisted of 400 Biology students, comprising 210 students in the experimental group which comprised 114 female students and 96 male while 190 students in the control group which comprised 86 male and 104 female. Simple random sampling technique was used to select two local government areas out of the nine local government areas. Purposive sampling technique was used in selecting two schools each from the two selected local government areas. The instrument used for data collection was the Biology Achievement Test (BAT) based on their objectives and content areas and was made up of 50 multiple choice items.The reliability of the instrument was 0.79 computed using Kuder Richardson Formular 20 (KR-20). The instrument was administered in 2 stages, pretest and post-test. Mean and standard deviations were used to answer the research questions while analysis of covariance was used to test the hypothesesat 0.05 level of significance. From the result of the analysis, it was found out that the achievement mean score of the students in Biology test was higher when taught with concept mapping than the lecture method. The female students’ achievement mean score was higher than the male students in Biology when taught using concept mapping and lecture method; the students in schoolslocated in Urban area had higher achievement score in Biology when taught using concept mapping than those of the rural areas. The result of the hypothesis revealed that there was no significant difference in the achievement mean scores of students’ in Biology when taught using concept mapping and lecture method. There was no significant difference in the achievement mean score of male and female students in Biology when taught using the concept

mapping andlecture method. There was no significant difference in the achievement mean score of students located in schools within rural areas and urban areas in Biology when taught using concept mapping. Based on the findings, recommendations were made and they include, that students should be taught how to construct concept maps in various topics in Biology; concept map teaching model should be incorporated in the new curriculum to supplement existing methodologies, the lecture method and the concept mapping strategy should be combined to help foster academic achievement in Biology.

BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

1.1    INTRODUCTION

1.2    STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

1.3    PURPOSE OF THE STUDY

1.4    RESEARCH QUESTIONS

1.5    HYPOTHESES

1.6    SIGNIFICANCE OF STUDY

1.7    SCOPE OF THE STUDY

REVIEW OF LITERATURE

2.1       CONCEPTUAL FRAME WORK

2.1.1     Concept of concept mapping

2.1.2     Advantages of Concept Mapping

2.1.3      Disadvantages of Concept of Mapping

2.1.4     Construction of Concept Mapping

2.1.5     Concept Mapping Teaching Strategy on Students Achievement in Science

2.16     Gender and Teaching Strategies on Students Achievement in Science

2.1.7     School Location and Teaching Strategies on Students’ Achievement in Science

2.2    THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

2.2.1      Constructivist learning theory of Piaget (1987)

2.3      RELATED EMPIRICAL STUDIES

2.4      SUMMARY OF RELATED LITERATURE

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

3.1      RESEARCH DESIGN

3.2      AREA OF THE STUDY

3.3      POPULATION OF THE STUDY

3.4      SAMPLE AND SAMPLING TECHNIQUE

3.5      INSTRUMENT FOR DATA COLLECTION

3.6      VALIDATION OF THE INSTRUMENT

3.7      RELIABILITY OF THE INSTRUMENT

3.8     METHOD FOR DATA COLLECTION

3.9    METHOD OF DATA ANALYSIS

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

4.1      RESULTS

4.2      MAJOR FINDINGS

4.3      DISCUSSION OF FINDINGS

SUMMARY, CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS

5.1       SUMMARY

REFERENCE

APPENDIX BIOLOGY ACHIEVEMENT TEST