ABSTRACT
The non-proficiency of Nigerian students in Biology has been a major concern of the research. Therefore, the researcher problem into the causes of mass failure in Biology in senior secondary schools in Logo Local Government Area of Benue State.
The research was carried out in five secondary schools in Logo Local Government Area. Questionnaire was designed for the purpose of data collection from a hundred students chosen at random with twenty students from each school. The simple percentage and frequency distribution tables were used to analyse the data.
The study revealed that the students believed that Biology is an interesting subject to study, but that lack of qualified teachers, inadequate teaching materials, bad reading culture, parents’ illiteracy, bad attitude of students to Biology, poor environmental conditions, overpopulation in the classroom, laziness of teachers to work, and truancy on the part of the students cause failure in Biology.
From the findings, if the recommendations are carefully considered and employed by the teachers, school authorities and government, mass failure among students in Biology would be reduced.
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY
The teacher of Biology has been facing a lot of problems especially in secondary school in Logo Local Government Area of Benue State. The problems at this level had resulted into many other problems confronting the students of higher institutions of learning, with what has been experienced in the past and present about the side of seriousness of the students to Biology motivated me to focus attention on the problems encountered by the students and teachers alike as regards Biology.
Also, this will involve the enumeration and analysis of the problems facing the teaching of the subject, suggested solution will also be given. Many students count Biology as a difficult subject in secondary schools nowadays due to their negative attitude to it. Also, many students find it difficult to read Biology textbooks because they have no time to read. Many students have this to say about Biology, ‘I have interest in other subjects but not Biology’. The reason for this could be traced back to students’ poor foundation in the study of Biology. Therefore, if students in higher institutions of learning can go on complaining that Biology is difficult to comprehend, what then will be the fate of secondary school students who depend so much on the students in the higher institutions.
In fact, many students fail their final year examinations both at junior and senior secondary schools in Biology due to one reason or the other such as parental responsibilities, students’ factor, schools’ factor, government factor, lack of motivation, lack of relevant materials as well as inadequate curriculum. This has therefore motivated me to investigate the problem encountered by Biology teachers in Logo Local Government Area of Benue State. The negligence of Biology has driven many students in the past to mass failure in the final examination. Many people read Biology for examination purposes only.
1.2STATEMENT OF RESEARCH PROBLEM
A lot of problems have contributed to students’ mass failure in Biology in Logo Local Government Area of Benue State. Many parents blame the teachers’ negative attitude to work while many pupils’ negligence of their class work contributes to failure as well. This research work purposely assesses the causes of the problems confronting students in Logo Local Government Area. So many scholars have written a lot about the problem of Biology in our secondary schools but work is very scanty on that of Logo Local Government Area. So it gives me a great concern to look at these problems and suggest possible solution to them.
1.3SIGNIFICANCE OF STUDY
Many scholars have written on Biology and its importance in the school curriculum. This project is an additional effort in this direction. It will go a long way to assist the teaching of Biology in Logo Local Government.