THE APPROPRIATE USE OF INSTRUCTIONAL MATERIAL IN PROMOTING TEACHING AND LEARNING OF BIOLOGY IN PUBLIC SECONDARY SCHOOL

CHAPTER ONE

1.1       INTRODUCTION

            The development of educational technology has come a very long way. It can be said to have started from the period when man started its expedition of influencing the course of nature. Ogunranti et. al., (1984) identified three main stages through which what has come to be known as educational technology today develop:

·         Stone age generation when the early men life activities was untended on the use of rocks and stones.

·         Book and chalk board generation: teaching here was done using of chalk boards, book, and this never made people to study on their own.

·         The mass communication generation these stage resulted from advancement in technology of teaching. The use of instructional materials in teaching biology have become as almost common place in the use of text books and available materials in the laboratory. It has a positive effect on student achievement, student who are presented with opportunity to use manipulative report that they are more interested in biology and long term interest translates to increase student ability.

At the beginning of last century, children were taught in rigidly formal and stereotype way. Education was then conceived as a process of transmission of factual knowledge only. The teacher adopted an authoritarian attitude, the facts learnt by children were tested from time to time but such test. Were neither concerned with conceptual understanding nor effective performance. The main emphasis was on testing memory. A long time intervened between child response and teacher reinforcement the teacher often used the lecture method which was not much effective for meaningful learning in which other usual materials were not used to supplement his oral teaching. The modern teacher to Good (2003) considers each child as a in to a plant and helps the child to grow according to its abilities and aptitudes he helps the child to learn.

            The modern teacher sees education as a process of interaction between the child and his environment, the child learn by doing and learn how to learn in groups and also individually increase n population and explosion of knowledge are effecting the pattern of human life and also influences it full impact on education and this is possible by the use of instructional materials which can be conserved as the development of educational technology. Hoilman (2007) said children who learn science by discovery especially biology approach will discoren for themselves the true structure of the discipline in complete harmony with modern philosophy of science education, the teaching, learning resource materials on secondary school biology consist of textbook, student manual and teacher guide for secondary school students. There is no denying the fact that knowledge is a universal commodity but the matter of its presentation is an individualized effort. The teaching of biology is very important because the knowledge of biology helps in improving the quality of life, biology covers all aspects of life, so if goes without saying that biology should be thought in order to succeed in life. The problem of education relating to quality and quality could be tacked by the proper utilization of instructional materials.

            Instructional technology is a systematic way of designing, carrying out an evaluating the teaching learning process. Instructional technology make instruction more effective, understandable, and meaningful. All types of resources are used to make learning easy. Traditional teacher centred approach in the classroom has been shifted from teaching to learning. It is called student centred being the resource, Bilbao (2006) pointed out that learning through hearing alone proves to be the least effective means of learning. One learns eleven percent by heaping as against eight. Three percent by seeing. As far as retention of hearing concerned, learning through hearing stands at the lowest because after three days, we recall only ten percent of what we learning hearing as fifty percent of what we learn through both hearing and seeing and ninety percent of what we acquire by applying the tree senses, that is being hearing and doing. The teaching of resources and teaching of biology in our public secondary schools cannot be over emphases it is to achieve optimum communication outcome in terms of pedagogy with the students to achieve this the teacher has not only to work relentlessly but also to male use of resources or instructional materials in an attempt to facilitate better communication and understating of the subject matter instructional materials will reduce the task of teacher in the classroom, instructions, it will help to facilitate and create pleasant atmosphere for learning. In addition, the use of instructional materials provides teachers and student the opportunity of developing the ability to imaging to improve and relate to things they observed in reality.

            Teachers in both private and public secondary school should both rely on verbal instruction alone but they should be encourage to use appropriate instructional materials they should know that instructional materials gives colour to their classroom instruction it will also tie verbal concept and give the student sense of the belonging and perfect understanding of the concept.

1.2       PURPOSE OF THE STUDY

            It was been observed that many researchers have contributed immensely to the usage of biological instructional materials in teaching and learning of biology. This study is emphasing on the appropriate use of instructional materials in a way to promote  the teaching and learning of biology in Odeda public secondary schools.

            Effort of these will be based on finding o know if adequate biology laboratory is been administered with instructional materials towards achieving the goals there by reduce failure rate in or biology.

1.3       STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

            The teaching of biology with the proper use of instructional materials will enhance teaching and learning process. Various studies are reported in Sotayo (2010) revealed that proper use of instructional materials will positively enhance teaching and learning process. It also promotes interactive teaching and effective learning. As laudable as the role of instructional materials in the art of teaching and learning is, Educations have shown that there is lack of teaching resources in schools, this study may fall the gap displayed indentify some casual link between the teacher instructional materials used and its effects to the teaching and learning process.

1.4       SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

            The significant of the study is to identify the correlation of modern instructional materials to the academic performance of secondary school level in teaching biology the analysis revealed that the teaching with the application of instructional materials as supplementary strategy in teaching biology is more effective because the use of instructional materials increase interest and enhanced motivation levels modern instructional materials as supplementary strategy were also found to be equally effective for lower sections and higher section on the basis of findings, researcher provided workable suggestion, recommendations for enhancing the effective learning of structure biology at secondary school level.

            Also, this study will assist the biology teachers in secondary school to known the importance of instructional materials and interest of the student and motivate their learning ability.

Research questions

Considering the statement of the problem of this study, the following research question were generated to guide this work.

i.                    Are the instructional materials available in schools in biology laboratory?

ii.                  Do the teachers make use of the materials during teaching?

iii.                The use of instructional materials does it improve the performance of learning in biology?

iv.                Does instructional materials motivate the attitude and interest of the students?

1.5       SCOPE OF THE STUDY/AREA

            This research was designed to cover four public secondary school in Odeda local governed area of Ogun State out Public Secondary School in Odeda the following school will be used:

1.      Salawu Abiola Comprehensive High School Osiele.

2.      Isolu High School, Alabata

3.      Nawairud-den Grammar School, Obantoko

4.      Asero High School, Asero.