A Study of the Effects of Computer-Assisted Packages on the Performance of Senior Secondary Students in Chemistry in Zaria Educational Zone, Kaduna State Nigeria

Abstract

This study investigated the effect of computer-assisted instruction (CAI) package on the performance of Senior Secondary Students in Zaria, Kaduna state, Nigeria. The study also examined the significance difference of retention achievement scores of students taught using computer-assisted instruction and the conventional lecture method. The population for the study was made up of all the 1800 SSII senior secondary schools chemistry students in Zaria Educational zone, Nigeria The sample consisted of forty senior secondary school students and was drawn from two secondary schools. Stratified random sampling was used to select the 40 students (20 males and 20 females) four research questions and four hypotheses were formulated, and tested at 95% confidence level. Chemistry Achievement Test (CAT) and Chemical Retention Test (CRT) made of 50 items of multiple-choice questions each were developed and validated for data collection. The Chemistry achievement Test (CAT) was administered to students as pretest-posttest and the Chemistry Retention Test (CRT) as a post treatment-test. The results of students were analyzed using t-test statistics to test the hypotheses. The result indicated that there is a significant difference between the performances of students taught using (CAI) package, and those taught using the conventional lecture method of instruction(t cal=7.77>tcrit=2.093 at P t crit=2.093 at P< 0.05 The result also showed there was no significant difference in the post-test performance scores of male and female students taught using CAI of package. Based on the findings it was concluded that the use of computer assisted instructional packages significantly improved the performance of students in chemistry. It was recommended that Computer-Assistant instructional packages should be encouraged for teaching and learning of chemistry.