Students’ Perception on the Indices of Teaching Effectiveness Among Some Senior Secondary School ESL Students in Ibadan Metropolis

The teaching of English language in Nigeria is a herculean task given the fact that models and students operate in a second language environment with its many disadvantages. Many teachers do not seem to understand what is involved in teaching effectiveness as many have different conceptions of teaching. The result is that many evade the intricacies of teaching, to the detriment of students’ achievement in the subject. This paper investigated students’ perception on the indices of teaching effectiveness of ESL in Ibadan metropolis. The descriptive design of the ex post facto type was adopted for the study. Through multi-stage sampling procedure, a total of 500 Senior Secondary School two students was drawn from six co-educational institutions. A self-structured questionnaire – questionnaire on indices of teaching effectiveness (QOITE) (r=.79) was used to collect data. Three research questions and one hypothesis were raised. Descriptive statistics of frequency counts, percentages, mean and standard deviation were used to analyse the data collected. T-test statistic was used to test the only hypothesis stated at 0.05 level of significance.Findings revealed that students perceived the indices of teaching effectiveness to include revision of previous topics, teachers’ friendly disposition, use of instructional materials and take-home assignments. The study however revealed that the most commonly perceived indices of teaching effectiveness are teachers’ knowledge of subject matter (65.8%) and teachers’ ability to provide detailed explanation (57.8%). In addition, more female students perceived that revision of previous work was needed for effective teaching than their male counterparts.The study recommended, among other things, that teachers should make revision of previous work a regular practice and teachers of ESL should exhibit high level of friendliness in class.


Introduction
It is no longer disputable that English language as a foreign or a second language has received so much attention in Nigerian education. It is the language of education even though the three national languages (Ibo, Yoruba and Hausa) are used for instruction at the lower levels of education. The ability to speak English language fluently, as well as communicate effectively with it in writing, remains a criterion for employability, even for jobs which may not require paper qualifications. It is not surprising, then, that at all levels of education, including the nonformal education, students study maximally to pass examinations on English language.
In Nigeria and all over the world, the English language is the language of the internet. It is the global lingua franca (Essays, U.K. 2018). On the internet, it is the language in which learning is carried out in different fields like science and technology, commerce, religion and humanities and others. For this reason, self-teaching can be carried out by all and sundry for personal development and improvement. The internet also makes it possible for the English language to be studied alongside other languages like Igbo, Yoruba, Hausa, French among others. The English equivalents of words in many other languages are provided online. This goes to further illustrate how essential the language is to speakers of other languages.
English language is rich in vocabulary -a vocabulary that is constantly evolving, making it easy for new ideas and inventions to receive their suitable nomenclature. With the growth in science and technology, the English Language has provided names for different phenomena. Words like multimedia, selfie, multilink, iphone, networking are all new terms in media technology. As many as 1,000 words evolve every year in English vocabulary to meet different needs (Linguaenglish, 2015) In Nigerian secondary schools, English Language is an object of study as well as the language of instruction.The criteria for identifying teaching effectiveness in this important field of study have remained a matter of concern to language educators. The important status of English language in the secondary school curriculum calls for its effective teaching. According to Little, Goe & Bell (2009), there are different methods of measuring teachers' effectiveness, including value added models and classroom observations. In this research, SS II students' perception of the indices of their English teachers' effectiveness were investigated. Even though other factors like school type, students' socio-economic status and home factors affect students' achievement in English language, teachers' effectiveness plays an important role .A combination of many factors including ineffective teaching has led to poor performance in West African School Certificate Examinations in recent times.   (Tables 1and 2), one can see that in an educationally endowed state (Ekiti) and educationally disadvantaged state (Kebbi) 60.24% and 43.6% had 5 credits and above including English. It meant that 40% and 57% of the population of students in these state failed English Language. This calls for thorough investigation into the best ways of teaching ESL in Nigerian schools.

Literature Review Problems of Teaching and Learning English Language in Nigerian Secondary Schools
Teachers and students in Nigerian secondary schools encounter myriads of problems in the course of facilitating and acquiring the knowledge of ESL. In a community where English is a second language and teachers who are non-native speakers of the language battle against various odds to facilitate learning, one cannot but expect a scenario described above. Many students dread having to sit for English language examinations just as many English teachers avoid teaching certain topics in English language when they are under supervision. Various scholars have investigated the problems associated with teaching and learning English. The researcher has observed the following anomalies in English language classes: -Difficulty in getting students to adhere to the use of standard English. Nigerian English features regularly in writings. -The issue of large classes which makes it difficult to provide individual attention to students -The arrangement of making only one teacher handle all the aspects of English in a given class with various streams -Unconducive working environments -Non provision of regular retraining activities for teachers, particularly at the secondary school level. -Phobia among some students which makes them feel that they can never excel in English. Corroborating the views above, Fatiloro (2015) noted that overpopulation, lack of teaching facilities and students' laissez faire attitudes are problems that bedevil the teaching of English language in Nigerian secondary schools. Also, Obiegbu (2016) added that mother tongue interference, non-adherence to standard English and decline in students' reading culture constitute problems or challenges of teaching English Language in Nigeria. Fatiloro further stressed that Nigerian secondary school students are merely interested in passing the certificate exams in English without striving to build residual knowledge for functionality in society. Evue (2013) and Hosain (2018) expatiated on teachers' factors that militate against the effective teaching of English in Nigerian schools. According to Evue, teachers exhibited these traits leading to poor performance on the part of the students of English language in Delta State secondary schools: -non coverage of course content -inability of teachers to teach oral English -lack of ICT skills by teachers -teachers' general inability to teach effectively The findings of Hosain (2018) revealed that other factors like lack of appropriate teaching materials, lack of rich teaching experiences and lack of infrastructure combine to make English language teaching unproductive. Even though Hosain carried out his research outside Nigeria, he pointed out that lack of efficient teachers (ineffectiveness in teaching) contributed to students' failure in English. This paper examined the indices of teaching effectiveness in ESL classes as perceived by some secondary school students in Ibadan. The objective of this research or the idea behind it is that the result obtained (in terms of how students perceive effectiveness in teaching) from this study would enable every English teacher to employ the strategies or practices that students find useful. These, no doubt, would help to advance the teaching of English language. At this juncture, it is important to examine the meaning of teaching effectiveness as well as indices of teaching effectiveness.

Indices of Teaching Effectiveness
The act of teaching has, over the years, been held in high esteem by all and sundry because of its capability to sharpen learners' character and equip them with worthwhile knowledge. Teaching is the sum total of all the activities carried out in a classroom to ensure that learners achieve some goals. It has been defined in various ways. According to Smith (2018), teaching refers to those specific interventions that are used to get students to learn various things. Such interventions could be any form of activity like questioning, demonstration, written work, group work with discussions, observation of entities among others. They include the skills and attitudes that each teacher exhibits in a classroom setting with a view to influencing learners' behaviours positively (Uddin, Uwameiye and Nwachoka, 2019).Coupled with these skills and attitudes is deep knowledge of an area of specialization that a teacher must be confident to teach, according to the needs of the learners. A teacher is therefore not a person who has mechanically internalised knowledge for the purpose of helping learners pass examination. He or she has skills that relate to psychological and social well-being of the learners thereby fostering friendship in the learning arena. It is not easy to impart knowledge to learners if a learning facilitator (the teacher) does not form friendships with his or her students. To Onwuka (1996), teaching is the process of making it possible for someone to learn. He added that: In the school situation, teaching involves the determination of worthwhile objectives, the selection and arrangement of learning experiences, guidance, motivation as well as testing and correcting with a view to ensuring and improving upon learning. Depending on the degree of exposure, experience and professional training a teacher has undergone, expertise and teaching effectiveness can vary from teacher to teacher. The activity of teaching is perceived by teachers and students in different ways. The perception of the profession by each teacher will determine what he or she performs in the classroom (Onwuka, 1996). Also, students might regard an English teacher who gives them high scores after examinations and tests as an effective teacher even when they have not really acquired knowledge. This research concentrates on identifying those indices or criteria that constitute teaching effectiveness from the point of view of students so as to adopt their views for maximum learning.
Effective teaching is associated with a collection of practices. It spans across teachers' disposition, classroom practices and clear understanding of professed disciplines by teachers. Many scholars in the field of education have tried to expatiate on the meaning of teaching effectiveness by trying to pinpoint its constituents. For teaching to be effective, a teacher must know what is meant by teaching -all the activities that constitute teaching must be logical and purposeful. It must not include a process that is detrimental and injurious to a student's emotional wellbeing. Also, any effective teaching must bring about learning. Both teacher and students are therefore expected to co-operate in order to make teaching effective.
Since one of the problems associated with teaching English has to do with teachers' inability to teach effectively, examining the nature of effective teaching is an important aspect of this paper. It is necessary to see the indices that make up teaching effectiveness, particularly in the English language class. Many scholars have measured teaching effectiveness in English language classes by examining students' scores. In other words, when students score high grades after being taught, particularly in a terminal examination, it is believed that the teacher has taught effectively. While this can be an index of effective teaching, teaching effectiveness cannot be measured by students' achievement alone. It is certainly obvious that if a teacher adheres to all the indices of teaching effectiveness like planning educational objectives, creating a friendly teaching climate, creating interventions and reinforcing learning, students' scores will likely be high. It is also possible to tailor all teaching activities towards passing terminal examinations, in which case knowledge acquired may be short-lived. Learning acquired through effective teaching is supposed to be permanently habitual and instrumental to the building of more knowledge. According to Onwuka (1996), the following are the principles that ensure effective teaching: -choice of methods that will make people express themselves.
-Making students learn through participation -Identifying students' areas of interest and planning lessons accordingly.
-Utilizing students' past experiences in building new knowledge -Encouraging transfer of learning -Encouraging students to make their own discoveries.
-Helping students to learn other things outside the stated objectives.
-Teachers ensuring that they put their whole being into the teaching activities -Taking teaching item in bits -Creating an attitude of lifelong learning in students -Doing revisions occasionally -Asking different levels of questions in the course of teaching -Using immediate reinforcement -Utilizing audio-visual aids -Being as realistic as possible in the choice of topics In addition to the indices listed above, Ko, Sammons and Bakkum (2013) added that effective teachers are those teachers who possess adequate knowledge of their disciplines as well as proper behaviours in class. The teacher's behaviour is expected to depict friendship and strong desire to help students achieve their objectives. The teacher is expected to be a disciplinarian without being authoritarian. He or she must allow students to know the reasons why certain activities are to be done in class and he must not be prejudiced. His behaviour which must be positive is needed to create a learning atmosphere and motivate students in class. In this paper, the indices of teaching effectiveness to be investigated include the following: -Teachers' disposition in ESL classes -Teachers' constant revision of previous work -Teachers' use of instructional materials -Teaching through the use of assignments and projects -Teachers' communication -Teachers' knowledge of the English Language as perceived by students.

Teaching English as a Second Language
Learners of English as a second language, particularly in Nigeria, require special attention from their teachers in order to enable them to measure up to standards in terms of approximating native-like expression. According to Odiaka (2009), as an L2 learner works toward achieving the standard of the native speakers of English, the learner internalises a language repertoire known as inter-language.This inter-language which is a continuum between L 1 and L 2 , (where L 1 is the learner's native language) is full of phonological, grammatical semantic and morphological errors. The teachers of English as a second language who, in most ESL classes are non-native speakers of English, therefore, have a lot of issues to grapple with. In the first place, teachers of ESL should be acquainted with a lot of theories of second language teaching. For instance, the knowledge of the Theory of Contrastive Analysis (CA) would enable an ESL teacher to identify areas of language learning that are proving difficult for a learner owing to mother tongue interference. According to Odiaka (2009), contrastive analysis attributes language learning errors exclusively to mother tongue interference where features of the native language are transferred to the target language. Knotty areas arising from mother tongue interference must be handled properly by the teachers of English. The Theory of Error Analysis (EA) enables the English teacher to handle errors accruing from mother tongue interference as well as developmental errors. Other theories that the teacher of ESL must be armed with are theories of Traditional Grammar, Structuralism and Transformational Generative Grammar (TGG). Psychological theories like Behaviourism and Cognitivism are all related to these language learning theories. While behaviourism stresses the relationship between the environment and language learning, cognitivism relates language learning to innate features in the learner which facilitate language learning. Of great importance too, is the Theory of Communicative Language Teaching (CLT). This theory is instrumental to modern language learning since the basic function of language is communication (Xia, 2014). Theories generally are like guides that the ESL teacher can utilise in any given language teaching situation to remedy hitches and take necessary actions to achieve stated objectives. Depending on the situations in the classrooms, they necessitate and facilitate the move from one stage of teaching to another.
Other ingredients that ESL teaching requires include motivation and positive attitude towards the teaching and learning of English Language. Motivation, summarily is the activity or situation that creates drive among the learners. If an ESL teacher comes to the learning arena with a positive attitude (this, of course, stems from adequate preparation of notes of lessons and passion for the act of teaching), this automatically affects the students' disposition. According to Widyalankara (2014), being armed with theories by the ESL teacher is not enough. He or she should create a stimulating environment for language learning. The ideas of Ellis (2003), Castello (2015), Hashuni and Yunus (2018) fall in line with this. They stated that interaction during the ESL class would do students a lot of good. Ellis (2003)

stated thus:
The students' motivation should be paid a considerable attention since motivation is actually the driving force for the students to move further.
Overcoming previous problems can be done by involving learners in performing two types of communication tasks: focused communication asks and unfocused communication tasks. The quotation above emphasises the fact that participatory activities which may be in form of classroom debates, discussions, brainstorming and even group work can create drive in students to learn. Various forms of interaction create room for language utilisation and mastery, giving speech its primary place in language learning. Utilising ICT devices, creating a friendly atmosphere and presenting teaching items with passion are the different ways of motivating students, including various forms of reinforcement.

Theory of Effective Teaching
This descriptive work on indices of teaching effectiveness is anchored on the Joint Action Theory in Didactics.(JATD).This theory was propounded by Sensevy in 2012 to explain the joint actions among the teacher, items of knowledge and the students within the teaching-learning process. It sees learning as a contract between the teacher and the student as well as a game where the teacher wins the game if the student happens to learn.It therefore sees the achievement of a stated goal as a winning act on the part of the teacher.
Coupled with the picture of teaching and learning as a game is the fact that the reservoir of knowledge or previous knowledge (contract) and the new knowledge (milieu) empowers the teacher and the students to act. On the part of the teacher, knowledge of theories as well as the knowledge of the subject matter enables him to navigate through the teaching learning process and organise learning activities for his students. In the presentation of the new knowledge, students engage in problem solving techniques to unravel the new knowledge while the teacher watches out for behaviours that point to acquisition of the new knowledge.
While this theory presents a picture of what teaching effectiveness is, it is important to point out its relationship to this research.In the first place, it presents students as those who must remain active in the teaching learning process.It stresses the activation of previous knowledge, teachers and students relationship and the constant building of knowledge.In other words, this theory indirectly explains that effective teaching may not be feasible without the followings: -Revision of previous work -Building of new knowledge -Teachers' skillful presentation of learning items ( including the use of instructional aids) -Students engaging actively in learning to build knowledge (class and take-home assignments) -Cordial and amicable relationship between teachers and students -Clarity in communication and possession of communication skills. All these indices listed above constituted the items tested in this study.

Statement of the Problem
Teaching effectiveness is needed to enhance students' learning and improve human resources. It also helps to achieve national objectives. Different indices like teachers' personality, students' achievement scores, nature of classroom interactions among others, are used to measure teaching effectiveness. Most importantly, it is measured by the extent to which stated objectives have been achieved by students.
Despite the efforts put in by teachers in the past, students' performance in English Language has not been too encouraging particularly in educationally disadvantaged states in Nigeria. Apart from the failure recorded in national examinations, post-secondary education students and graduates find it difficult to carry out discourse confidently in the English language. The result of this is that employers of labour find many graduates performing below expectation in terms of communication skills. Written items for public perusal are replete with erroneous expression. Many studies have measured teaching effectiveness from the point of view of students' scores in English. This study therefore investigated the indices of teaching effectiveness from the point of view of students' perceptions and opinions.

Research Questions
The following research questions guided this study: (a)What are the indices of teaching effectiveness as perceived by students in ESL classes? (b)How do students perceive the use of instructional materials by their English teachers? (c)To what extent do students perceive the revision of previous topics as an index of teaching effectiveness?
Hypothesis H01: There is no significant difference between male and female students' perception on review of previous topics as an index of teaching effectiveness in ESL classes.

Research Methodology
This study adopted the descriptive research design of the ex post facto type.

Population and Sampling Techniques
The population of this study consisted of all SSS two students in all the secondary schools in Ibadan metropolis, Oyo State, Nigeria. Through stratified sampling technique, six schools were chosen from urban and semi urban areas of Ibadan metropolis. Through purposive sampling technique, all the SSSII students were chosen from the six co-educational institutions. A total of 604 students (male and female) were randomly selected from the six schools chosen from whom 500 copies of useful questionnaire were retrieved. A self-structured questionnaire was the only instrument used in this research-Questionnaire on Indices of Teaching Effectiveness (QOITE). It was a seventeen item questionnaire used to elicit information on students' perception on the indices of teaching effectiveness. This instrument was given to experts in the field of language teaching to ascertain the face and content validity. It was also subjected to a reliability test using Cronbach Alpha statistic. A correlational coefficient of .79 was obtained (r= .79). The questionnaire was divided two part with part A eliciting information on the demographic variables of the participants. Part B contained 15 items using a fourpoint Likert scale of Strongly Agree(SA), Agree (A), Strongly Disagree (SD) and Disagree (D). Five other items included were open ended questions that students answered using their own sentences.

Research Procedure
The researcher co-opted four research assistants who were trained for two weeks on the nature of the research to be done. These research assistants were drawn from the participants of the Work Study Programme of the University of Ibadan. Details of the questionnaire were explained to the research assistants after which they were given letters of introduction to the various schools chosen for the research. They finally distributed the copies of the questionnaire to participants who filled same under their supervision. The researcher also monitored the research assistants. 604 copies of questionnaire were retrieved out of which 500 were found usable.   Table 4 shows that 247 (49.4%) of the participants were below 15 years of age while 242 (48.6%) of years 10 participants (2.0%) were aged 21years and above. It then means that the largest number of participants was below 15 years.

Methods of Data Analysis
The research made use of frequency counts and percentages to analyse demographic data. Frequency counts and percentages were used to analyse data for research question one. Means and standard deviation were used for research questions two and three. T.test was used to test the null hypothesis stated.

R01:
What are the indices of teaching effectiveness as perceived by students in English language classes in Ibadan? ). This was followed by the ability of the English teacher to give detailed explanation. (57.8%). They also indicated that teachers' confidence and friendly disposition contributed to effective teaching (55.0%). 51.2% of the students (256) mentioned that an effective teacher should always give students individual attention. The fact that knowledge of subject matter and teachers' detailed explanation have the highest frequencies shows that these students considered teachers' repertoire of knowledge to be of utmost importance. This is in alignment with the assertion of Ko, Sammons and Bakkum (2013) who stated that effective teachers are those who possess adequate knowledge of their disciplines. These same authors endorsed the fact that effective teachers must exhibit good character while teaching students. An English teacher who does not establish good rapport with his or her students may not be able to achieve good results. R0 2 : How do students perceive the use of instructional materials by English language teachers? Analysis of students' responses shown in Table 6 above indicated that students had a positive perception towards the use of instructional materials by English language teachers in the English language classes as vast majority (68.4%; mean = 1.7407) of the respondents agreed to the fact that utilising instructional materials like pictures, gadgets, tv and radios in English classes enhanced their understanding of the subject and that the use of instructional materials helped the teacher to cover a lot of grounds making learned items easy to remember (78.0% = .88353). The respondents disagreed with the question item which suggested that the use of instructional materials in English language class is a waste of time (63.0% respondents' disagreement; mean = 2.7778). This finding corroborates the findings of Hosain (2018) andSmith (2018). While Smith (2018) recognised the observation of entities (instructional aids) as part of the interventions that lead to effective teaching, Hosain (2018) and Fatiloro (2015) stressed that absence of instructional materials has led to one of the knotty problem in teaching English language effectively. These are pointers to the fact that students desire these instructional materials as what should be utilised, but they are obviously not available or not regularly available according to Failoro (2015) and Hosain (2018). Onwuka (1996) also stated that the use of audio-visuals guides effective teaching. R0 3 : To what extent do students perceive the revision of previous topics as an index of effective teaching?  Table 7 presents the respondents' perception of the revision of previous topics as an index of effective teaching. Finding showed that majority of the respondents disagree with the questions items one and five which suggested that revision of previous work is bad and time wasting in the English language class. (55.2% respondents disagreement; mean = 3.2963); and they also disagreed with the item that suggested that it is better to go straight to a new topic rather than revise an old one (58.6% respondents disagreement; mean = 2.9259). Furthermore, the respondents seemed to like it when their teachers revised previous topics on the basis that it aided their understanding of the new topic. (86.0% respondents agreement; mean = 1.5185); they felt more prepared to learn when their teacher revised previous work (83.6% respondents agreement; mean = 1.4815) and they perceived that a teacher that does not revise a previous topic before teaching is not a good teacher (59.4% respondents agreement; mean = 2.4444). Thus, it can be concluded that revision of previous topics is one of the indices that students consider as part of effective teaching. This finding on the importance of revision of previous work in the course of teaching English corroborates the assertion of Onwuka (1996) and Castello (2015). Castello (2015) said that previous problems associated with learning can be solved if students are motivated through engagement in various tasks. Onwuka (1996) was of the view that revision should be constantly done in class to make students become focused. Hypothesis One: There is no significant difference between male and female students' perception on review of previous topic as an index of teaching effectiveness in ESC classes. The table above presents the mean difference of male and female students' perception on review of previous topic as an index of teaching effectiveness in English language class. The result showed that the mean for female (11.819) was significantly higher than that of their male counterpart (10.865) on their perception of review of previous topic as an index of teaching effectiveness in ESL classes. The t value obtained (2.22) is greater than 2.18 which is the critical t, using 498 as degree of freedom. Thus, the null hypothesis which stated that there is no significant difference between male and female students' perception on review of previous topic as an index of teaching effectiveness in English language is hereby rejected. It could be concluded that female students appear to show more preference for review of previous topic in English language class than their male counterparts. Since it has always been noted that girls appear to be more knowledgeable in the field of language learning than boys, girls' greater preference for revision of previous topics could be because of their interest in language learning too.

Conclusion and Recommendation
This study examined Senior Secondary School 2 (SSS II) students' perception on the indices of teaching effectiveness in the English language classes in Ibadan metropolis. Viewing the indices of teaching effectiveness from the angle of students in this study has helped to expound those practices in English language classes that students deem worthwhile. A large percentage of the participants in this study endorsed the practices of review of previous work, teachers' friendliness, use of instructional materials and classwork/homework as important indices of teaching effectiveness. Knowledge of English on the part of the teachers was also recognised as a major equipment for effective teaching. It was also realised that female students perceived review of previous topics as an important index of teaching effective more than their male counterparts. Based on the findings above, this study recommended as follows: -English teachers must endeavour to put on friendly dispositions during their interaction with students -Revision of previous topics (particularly topics that have bearing on a new topic) should be done regularly. -Teachers of ESL should possess sound knowledge of their subject matter. They should attend conferences and read recent books to update their knowledge. -English language teaching should be constantly supervised and evaluated by experts in the field to ensure that these indices of teaching effectiveness are adhered to, on a regular basis. -Schools and ministers of education should provide ample instructional materials for the teaching of English language. -Class exercises and take-home assignments should be a regular practice to enable students to have a firm grasp of the discipline.