Abstract
The study was designed to compare
mathematics achievement of private and public secondary school students in Uvwie
Local Government Area of Delta State. To direct the study, two hypotheses were
formulated. The study adopted the survey
research design
and the population of the study comprised all the senior secondary school students
in both public and private secondary schools in Uvwie Local Government Area of
Delta State. The sample size was four hundred and eighty students randomly
sampled from thirty schools. Data for the study were collected
using students
achievement test scores. In analyzing the data collected, the researcher used t-test
to answer the hypotheses. The data analyzed revealed that
there is a significant difference in the performance of public and private
secondary school students in mathematics and there is no significant difference
in the achievement of male and female students in mathematics. Based on
these findings, some recommendations were made at the end of the study.Introduction
Background of the Study
Mathematics
is very central in the teaching of science and many other school subjects.
Mathematics is a unifying subject and students’ interest in science cannot be
alienated from mathematics. Mathematics as a scientific tool is used to
interpret scientific phenomena. Mathematics is a language of science. Nasir
(2001) asserted that mathematics is an indispensable tool used by engineers,
scientists and many professionals in their search for a clear understanding of
the physical world. He stressed further that mathematics is mostly considered a
tool in that it contains the skills for problem-solving, organizing,
simplifying, interpreting data, performing calculations that are necessary in
fields such as science, business and industry. Today, mathematics is so
important to the extent that a credit pass in it is required to gain admission
to study various courses in higher institutions of learning, especially in the
faculties of management sciences, social sciences, sciences, agriculture,
engineering and medicine. Also, lack of basic understanding of science may
hinder one from explaining some of the daily events occurring in the
environment. One of the objectives of teaching science at the primary school
level is to inculcate in pupils basic knowledge for science to make them
scientifically literate. According to National Research Council (1996)
scientific literacy is the knowledge and understanding of scientific concepts
and processes required for personal decision-making, participation in civic and
cultural affairs, and economic productivity.
Mathematics
is seen as indispensable for scientific and technological development in the
society and it has been made a compulsory subject in secondary schools.
Specifically, it was made so in the National Policy on Education revised in
1998 and 2004. Considering the place and role of mathematics in the society,
its teaching is taken seriously, to improve upon it as well as sufficiently
realize its goals. It is the only subject that can be used in all cultures of
the world to produce the educated man. Mathematics is above all things that one
creates, for the teacher, it is something to be taught for the students,
something to be learned, and for the society something to be applied and which
would be applied more if there were persons capable of applying it.
From
the above it is crystal clear that mathematics is necessary for all categories
of people and important to individuals from all walks of life. It is also a
practical knowledge that is being applied by all and sundry in the course of
our daily life.
Makinde
(1987) acknowledged the indispensability of mathematics as the key of most if
not all the courses in the sciences. Social scientists found favour in
mathematics as it helps them predict correctly and precisely their experiment.
In every knowledge area it is often necessary, carrying out research work which
is aimed at finding out facts and to bring about improvements.
The
effects of mathematics educators are vehemently obvious in numerous written
works about ways of improving mathematics education through effective teaching
and learning of mathematics in secondary schools. A research carried out by
Osarumen (1995) indicated that many have the opinion that special ability has a
lot to do with performance of students in mathematics either at school certificate
level or internal examination in secondary schools. In view of this, it is
believed that in order to study mathematics, one need “certain ability” because
of the special difference that exists between the ordinary language and
technical language characteristics of mathematics.
In
recent years, there has been a rapid increase in students’ scholastic
malfunctioning and underachievement. It has been discovered that quite a number
of factors tend to combat effective teaching and learning in schools, accounting
for the said underachievement and scholastic malfunctioning (Agbatogun, 2009).
Research has identified numerous factors to this effect and such factors
according to Glickman (1991) comprise of the school, family, individual
(personal), social incentives and socio-economic conditions. Of all these, when
broken down into components the school and its related variables constitute a
chief factor.
Sikiru
(2005) reported that different school factors have been identified in
literature and that experts have agreed that school factors influence students’
learning. This was corroborated by Lubienski & Lubienski (2006) that recent
debates have highlighted the issue of school factors as an important
consideration in students’ academic achievement. Agbatogun (2009) highlighted
some school factors considered capable of making significant difference in
students’ academic achievement as principal administrative effectiveness,
teacher quality and effectiveness, school facilities (furniture, textbooks,
instructional materials, laboratory, library, classroom), school size, school
location, school type and many others like the content taught, individual
learning ability, methodology, environment, school and government policies, and
a host of others.
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