The Impact of Teachers’ Methodologies on Students’ Performance in Kuwait Primary Public Schools (Published)
The research examines the impact of the teachers’ methodologies on students’ performance in the Kuwaiti primary public schools. The research was conducted towards the beginning of the second semester of the academic year 2023/2024. The population of the study is the English teachers in the primary public schools in the six educational districts in Kuwait: Jahra, Ahmadi, Hawali, Mubaral al-Kabir, Farwaniya and Al-Asima. Currently there are about 262 primary schools in Kuwait spread across the six educational districts. The sample, randomly selected from among these school districts, consisted of 25 female English teachers selected from 18 schools representing the six educational districts of Kuwait. The English teachers in the selected schools were asked to respond to a 17-statement survey consisting of close- and open-ended questions. The responses provided by participants revealed that teachers’ methodologies all work towards the same common goal. This means the performance of primary students is largely being evaluated by the same few metrics of success. This reality means that primary teachers’ methods should be optimized instead of being completely changed. Part of this optimization is the improvement of teachers’ ability to implement emerging and new educational technologies into their classrooms. Doing this will help diversify primary teachers’ ability to work with students and prepare for the next major disruption to the traditional classroom environment. It can also be inferred from the results of the study that teaching methods focusing on differentiation often would be more impactful for primary students in Kuwait. Differentiation, at its core, works towards creating the most equitable learning environment for students and could lead to improved performance.
Keywords: Kuwait, Primary Education, Teaching Methods, digital learning
Perception of Teachers and Students towards Methods Used In Teaching and Learning of English Writing Skills in Secondary Schools (Published)
Writing skills are important for effective communication. However, the development of writing skills among learners depends on the methods used in teaching and learning. Recent survey of writing competence among students in schools shows that majority of them cannot write properly. This raises concern regarding methods used in teaching and learning. Low levels of writing skills in West Pokot have greatly affected overall mean scores in the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) examinations for the years 2009 to 2011 with mean scores dropping from 7.66 to 5.09. The purpose of the study was to determine the perceptions of teachers and students towards the methods used in teaching and learning of English writing skills in secondary schools in West Pokot County of Kenya. The objectives of the study were first, to establish teachers and students perception of methods used in teaching and learning of writing skills and second, to compare teachers and students perceptions of methods used in teaching and learning writing skills. The study population was 31 teachers of English and 2580 form four students. The sample size included 31 teachers of English and 334 form four students selected through simple random sampling technique. Data was collected through questionnaires and analyzed by use of mean and t-test. The study revealed that both teachers and students had negative perception towards methods used in teaching and learning of English writing skills and this was not statistically different(p-value=0.1594).
Keywords: Perception, Teaching Methods, Writing Skills