EFFECTS OF PRIOR KNOWLEDGE OF TOPICS AND THE INSTRUCTIONAL OBJECTIVES ON STUDENTS’ ACHIEVEMENT IN LITERATURE-IN-ENGLISH

Abstract

This study investigated the effects of prior knowledge of topics with their instructional objectives on senior secondary school class two (SS II) students. The study was carried out in Abakaliki Education Zone of Ebonyi State, Nigeria. The design of the study is quasi experimental of pretest-posttest of non-equivalent control group. Two research questions and two hypotheses guided the study. The population of the study was 6053 Senior Secondary School class 2 (SS II) Students in thirty nine Co-educational Secondary Schools in Abakaliki Education Zone. Simple random Sampling technique was used to draw a sample size of 120 SS II Students that offer literature-in-English in four Co-educational Secondary Schools in the Zone. Two of the schools formed the treatment group, while two formed the control group. Instrument for data collection was a researcher made literature-in-English Achievement Test (LAT). Data were collected from pretest and posttest. The data collected were analyzed using statistical mean, standard deviation, and Analysis of covariance (ANCOVA). The result of the study revealed that the treatment group taught Literature-in-English with prior knowledge topics and instructional objectives performed better than the control group taught Literature-in-English without prior knowledge of topics to be taught with their instructional objectives. The result also revealed that the performance of the students according to gender indicated that males performed better than females amongst the treatment group. However the mean achievement difference between the males and the females was not statistically significant. Based on the findings, the researcher recommended that Literature-in-English teachers should give their students topics to be learnt and this instructional objectives prior to instruction and secondly, that authors of texts in Literature-in-English should state the instructional objectives of each chapter or topic in their books.