Family Structure and School Age Children’s Achievement in and Attitude to Leadership Value Concepts in Social Studies and Civic Education

Abstract

Western education in Nigeria led to the involvement of schools in the maintenance of appropriate leadership values.However, appropriate leadership value manifestations among school age children in Nigeria who are the futureleaders are lacking. To maintain these values, studies have suggested that the family structure of a child plays animportant role. This study, therefore, using two modes of active learning strategies as treatment packages,determined the moderating effect of family structure on school age children’s’ achievement in and attitude toleadership value concepts in social studies and civic education in Delta State, Nigeria. The study adopted thepre-test-post-test, control group quasi-experimental design. Junior secondary students in Delta state made up thepopulation of the study. Multi-stage and simple random sampling techniques were employed in arriving at thesample. A total of two hundred and sixty – five students made up the study sample. Students’ Achievement inLeadership Values Test (r=0.90) and Students’ Attitude to Leadership Values Scale (r=0.78) were used asinstruments for data collection. Data were analysed using Analysis of Covariance, Estimated Marginal Mean andScheffé Pair-wise Comparism. The findings of the study showed that though family structure has a significant effecton students’ achievement in leadership value concepts in social studies and civic education, it is not so for students’attitude. Based on this finding, it was recommended that classroom teachers should take into consideration home –background factors in the teaching – learning process and consciously guide the learners into healthy communicationand relationships among themselves and the teacher.