Analysis of Senior High School Mathematics Teacher Characteristics and Utilization of Assessment Practices (Published)

The study sought to examine mathematics teacher characteristics that influence their use of assessment procedures in teaching and learning. The study adopted the descriptive survey design and the participants were 88 senior high school mathematics teachers sampled from the randomly selected schools from the Sunyani municipality. A four point Likert scale questionnaire was used to collect data from the respondents. The internal consistencies of the various sections of the instrument ranged from 0.69 to 0.78. The data collected were analysed using the independent t-test and one-way of variance ANOVA. The results from the study showed that assessment practices were not influenced by teacher characteristics such as gender and years of teaching. It was however found that professionalism of the teacher and exposure to INSET on classroom assessment influenced the use of assessment in the classroom. The recommendations drawn are that teachers must be encouraged and supported to participate in in-service training which retrains them on the need to involve assessment practices in teaching and learning. It is also recommended that professional teachers must be recruited to teach all subjects especially mathematics.

Keywords: Assessment, Classroom Practice, Feedback, Teacher Characteristics

A Comparative Study of the Teaching and Evaluation Processes in Sandwich Degree Programmes in Two Nigerian Universities (Published)

The training of teachers through the sandwich mode has been perceived by many as a medium for training teachers who cannot compete favourably in the labour market with those trained in the conventional universities. The reasons are attributed to some factors especially, the period stipulated for training in this program. It is against this background that this study compared the teaching and evaluation processes in sandwich B.Ed degree programs at University of Abuja ( Uniabuja) and University of Nigeria Nsukka ( UNN). A descriptive survey design was employed for the study. The population was made up of 560 and 676 final year students of Uniabuja and UNN respectively. Purposive and simple random sampling techniques were employed to select a sample of 100 students from each university thereby making a total of200 students. A four-point likert- scale questionnaire was used for data collection. Research questions were analysed with means scores while t-test was used to test the hypotheses. Results of this study show that there was significant difference in the extent to which course contents are covered in both universities and the evaluation and feedback mechanisms were effective. The study inter alia suggests an increase in the staff strength of lecturers in Uniabuja to help in the reduction of workload for more program effectiveness

Keywords: Assessment, Content coverage, Feedback, Sandwich, Teaching

Is Teaching Practice for Grading or Improvement? Examining Student teachers’ Perception and Experience at the University of Dar es salaam, Tanzania (Review Completed - Accepted)

Teaching practice is the central activity in testing teaching skills gathered in classroom learning and in preparing professional teachers in any country. The current study investigated student teachers perception and experience on the teaching practice supervisor’s treatment, student supervisor pre or post classroom discussion and teaching practice processes in general. The data to inform the study were collected from 112 student teachers: 67 were males and 45 females and the tools used were questionnaires both structured and non-structured. Of these 52 were second years while 60 were third years. Majority of respondents about 95(84.8) were pre service and 17 (15.2%) were in-service. The findings revealed that student teachers had positive perception on teaching practice exercise, teaching practice supervisor’s treatment, and supervisor-student feedback provision style. It was also discovered that demographic variables such as: sex, year of study and professional background had a slight influence on student teachers perception on teaching practice exercise, supervisors treatment, and supervisor-student feedback styles. In line to that 42 (37.5%) student-teachers’ acknowledged the concept that teaching practice is for improvement and the remaining percentages were given to factors associated to opposite dimension. It was therefore concluded that, there is a need for strengthening the teaching practice supervision exercise and specifically the collaboration between university teaching practice office and the teaching practice-host institutions should be improved so as to minimize the challenges emanating from miscommunication during the teaching practice exercise

Keywords: : Teaching practice, Assessment, Feedback, Perception, Supervision