Students' Attitudes towards Active Participation in Lectures as Influenced by Instructional Factors in Teacher Education Programmes

Abstract

Students’ attitude towards active participation in lectures in teacher education programmes has become a major concern to education managers in higher education circles as well as parents and quality agents. This research study seeks to address the emotive twin problem of non-attendance of lectures and dormancy during lectures on the part of student teachers. In this study, the two problems are referred to as lack of active participation in lectures in teacher education programmes. The objective of this study was to determine students’ attitude towards active participating in lectures in teacher education programmes in selected universities in Nakuru County, Kenya.This study was based on the Theory of Cognitive Dissonance for attitude change propounded by Festinger Leon (1957). The researcher conducted a critical review of literature related to students’ attitude towards participating in lectures. This research study adopted the descriptive survey research design. After piloting, the instrument was validated.Using the split half method and Spearman- Brown Correction formulae, the questionnaire scored a reliability coefficient of 0.7 and was accepted as reliable in line with the threshold recommended by Fraenkel and Wallen (2000).Data was collected from a study population of 310 fourth year bachelor of education students in6 Private and Public Chartered universities offering teacher education programs in Nakuru County, Kenya. The sample size was 257. The researcher employed stratified, purposive and simple random sampling techniques. Data from students’ questionnaires were coded and analyzed using tools in the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 22.0. Frequencies, percentages, means and standard deviations were computed. One- way Analysis of Variance, Post Hoc Test and T-tests were carried out to measure significant differences between means of samples.The study found out that students’ attitude towards active participation in lectures was more positive   in private universities (M = 2.60, SD = 0.41) than (M = 2.46, SD = 0.45) of public universities. The results further indicate that the difference between the two means was statistically significant, t (225) = 2.413, p=.017) at 0.05 alpha. This study therefore established that students enrolled in teacher education programmes in private universities have more positive attitudes towards active participation in lectures compared to their counterparts in public universities.The results of this study could be used by Commission for UniversityEducation and universities in Kenya to shape students’ attitude towards active participation in lecturesin teacher education programmes. The study recommends the need for further research on how quality of instructional activities  can be improved with a view to inculcating in students a positive attitude towards active participation in lectures in these universities.