CORRELATION BETWEEN STUDENTS’ ACHIEVEMENT IN THE THEORETICAL AND EMPIRICAL ASPECTS OF BIOLOGY IN SENIOR SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN EDU EDUCATIONAL ZONE OF KWARA STATE

Dangana Musa & Mohammed Idris

Abstract

In this study an attempt was made to find the comparison between students’ achievement in theoretical and empirical aspects in Biology. The study adopted a correlational research design which specifically, compared recorded scores of students in theoretical and empirical aspects of Biology. Two research questions and two hypotheses guided the study. A total of 90 SSIII students drawn from two secondary schools (urban and rural) within Edu educational zone of Kwara state were used. The students were drawn through simple random sampling technique. Mean and standard deviation of scores were used to answer the two research questions while Pearson Product-Moment Correlation analysis was used to test the two null hypotheses at p< 0.05. The result showed that students achieved better in the theoretical aspect than in the practical in biology in Edu Educational Zone of Kwara State. It also indicated that Gender and Location had differential effects on achievement of students in Biology Examination. The female students achieved more significantly better than their male counterparts in both theoretical and practical aspects. Therefore it was recommended that Biology teachers should pave way for more improvisation method in rural areas where there is lack of laboratories and give more priority to practical experiments as part of instruction in order to improve students’ understanding of practically related concepts.