SPECIAL VIDEO INSTRUCTION AND SENIOR SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS’ ANXIETY TOWARDS MENSURATION IN GWAGWALADA, NIGERIA

This study investigated the effects of special video instruction on senior secondary school students’ anxiety towards mensuration in Gwagwalada, Nigeria. It employed a quasi-experimental design of pre-test post-test non-randomized and non-equivalent control group design type. The population of the study comprised all senior secondary school 1 students in Gwagwalada area council. Three-stage sampling technique was applied to select two equivalent schools, assign the schools to experimental and control groups and eventually select one intact class from each of the two groups, the students of which formed the samples for the study. A total of 133 students participated in the study comprising 74 and 59 students in the Experimental group and control group respectively. Three research questions and three corresponding hypotheses were answered and tested respectively. Data used for the study were the scores of students’ responses to Mathematics Anxiety Questionnaire (MAQ). The data were analyzed using t-test, ANOVA and ANCOVA. The results are that special video instruction had a positive effect on students’ anxiety as students exposed to the video instruction recorded lower anxiety scores; and that both male and female students, and low, medium and high scorers benefited equally from the special instruction. It was however recommended among others that video instructions should be encouraged in secondary schools to reduce students’ anxiety towards Mathematics.  Article visualizations

Comparative Analysis of South West Students’ Performance in National Mathematics Olympiads Competitions in Nigeria

The main purpose of this study was to carry out a comparative analysis of the performance of South West students in the mathematics Olympiads competition organized annually in Nigeria by National Mathematical Centre, Abuja. Secondary data of the results of students for 2015, 2016 and 2017 Olympiads examinations in the six states of South West, Nigeria was collected and analyzed. Frequency count, percentage, mean and standard deviation were used to answer the three raised research questions while t-test and ANOVA were used to test the two formulated hypotheses. Results of the study showed that South West students’ performance for the three years was largely poor. The result also showed that male students performed better than their female counterparts. It was recommended among others that the National Mathematical Centre, Nigeria should make preparatory textbooks and other materials available and accessible to participating students to get them well prepared and perform better in the Olympiads. Keywords: Olympiads, National Mathematical Centre, Abuj

EFFECT OF ACTIVITY-BASED INSTRUCTIONAL STRATEGY ON SENIOR SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS’ RETENTION IN CIRCLE GEOMETRY IN ABUJA, NIGERIA

This study investigated the effects of activity-based instructional strategy on senior secondary schools students’ retention in circle geometry. The study employed a quasi-experimental design of the type pre-test, post-test groups design. The sample for the study comprised of 162 senior secondary 2 students drawn from two randomly selected co-educational schools in Federal Capital Territory, Nigeria. The research instrument was Mathematics Retention Test (MRT) containing items adapted from standardized WAEC questions. The test –retest method was employed for the reliability of the test instrument. The Pearson Product Moment Correlation Coefficient (r)=0.86 was obtained. Data collected were analyzed using t-test. The finding of this study revealed that there was a significant difference in the retention of students taught circle geometry using activity-based instructional strategy (ABIS) and the students taught circle geometry using conventional methods in favour of the students taught using ABIS. The study also indicated that there was no significant difference between the retention of male and female students in the experimental group who were taught circle geometry using ABIS. It was therefore recommended that mathematics teachers should use strategies that will encourage the active participation of students in mathematics classes such as ABIS which in turn would enhance retention. Also, governments at all levels should organize trainings and/or workshops for mathematics teachers on the use of ABIS in teaching mathematics.  Article visualizations