Effects Of Blended Learning On Biology Students Attitude And Achievement In Colleges Of Education In Kwara State Nigeria

Continuous increase in population of students in higher institutions of learning in Nigeria often results into overcrowded lecture rooms and laboratories, leading to poor performance of Biology students. Several strategies had been employed in previous studies to address the problem without much improvement in students’ achievement problem in Colleges of Education in Kwara State, Nigeria. There is, therefore, a need to find out if a method such as blended learning would address the problem. Moreover, there has been paucity of studies on students’ achievement in Biology using blended learning strategy. Hence, the objectives of this study were to investigate the: (i) effect of blended learning on students’ attitude towards Biology; (ii) effect of blended learning on students’ achievement in Biology; (iii) attitude of Biology students to blended learning based on gender ; (iv) attitude of Biology students to blended learning based on score level ; (v) difference in the achievement of Biology students exposed to blended learning based on gender (vi) difference in the achievement of Biology students exposed to blended learning based on score level; and (vii) interaction effect of treatment, gender and score level on attitude and achievement of Biology students.rnrnA quasi-experimental design was adopted for the study. Purposive sampling technique was used to select two Colleges of Education in Kwara State. The study involved (115) Biology students (experimental group = 48; control group = 67) comprising 82 females and 33 males. Attitude questionnaire, Achievement test, and an internet application, entitled, “Biology Blended Learning Package Application” were used. They were validated by two experts in Biology and four Educational Technologists. The attitude questionnaire had a reliability co-efficient of 0.83, using Cronbach alpha, while the achievement test had a reliability of 0.82, using split-half technique. Inferential statistics was used to analyze the data at 0.05 level of significance.rnrnThe findings of the study were that:rni. Biology students in Colleges of Education had positive attitude towards blended learning (X =63.00 , SD=17.09);rnii. there was a difference in the achievement of Biology students in the experimental and control groups in favor of those exposed to blended learning.( t (114) = 21.8, p <0.05);rniii. there was no significant difference in the attitude of male and female students exposed to blended learning ; rniv. there was a significant difference in the attitude of students exposed to blended learning, based on score level, in favor of medium score(F( 2, 44 ) = 1.66; p< 0.05) ; rnv. there was no significant difference in the achievement of male and female students exposed to blended learning; rnvi. there was a significant difference in the achievement of students based on score level, in favor of low score (F(2,44) = 36.39; p<0.05); andrnvii. there was no significant interaction effect of treatment, gender and score level on students’ attitude, and achievement.rnrnThe study concludedthat Colleges of Education Biology students exposed to blended learning had a better achievement. This implies that blended learning improved the performance of Biology students. The study recommended that blended learning should be integrated into the teaching and learning of Biology in Colleges of Education.

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