TEACHING AND LEARNING RESOURCE USAGE AND ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE OF VISUALLY IMPAIREDSTUDENTS IN BASIC EDUCATION SCHOOLS OF RWANDA

Abstract

The effective usage of resources in teaching and learning especially among students having visual impairment improves the academic performance and also enhances the completion of basic education. The purpose of this paper therefore, sought to find out the relationship between teaching and learning resources usage for visually impaired students and their academic performance basic education in Nyaruguru District in Rwanda.This paper employed descriptive correlational analysis with a sample of 5 school administrators, 125 untrained teachers, 34 trained teachers, 186 visually impaired pupils, and 5 librarians. Respondents and key informants were chosen on purpose and at random for this study. Slovens technique yielded a research sample of 188 respondents. The statistical programme for social sciences, version 21.0, was used to evaluate the data and create descriptive statistics such as frequency, percentage, mean, and standard deviation. The findings revealed that 84.7% strongly agreed that they use braille 84.8% strongly agreed that they use the slate and stylus 72.9% strongly agreed that they use the orbit reader 51.0% strongly agreed that they use cubes and cuberythms and 85.7% strongly agreed that they use plastic papers and drawing boards in their learning as a visually impaired student. It was also noted that 72.4% strongly agreed that students with visual impairments should sit for a second sitting 91.8% strongly agreed that the number of repeats among students with visual impairments is high due to inadequate materials. Furthermore, the study indicated that there is a statistical significant positive relationship between teaching and learning resources usage for visually impaired students and their academic performance basic education in Nyaruguru District in Rwanda. The study recommends that visually impaired students tools that may be used in both public and private institutions, and train teachers on how to use those materials should be given.