Effects of the Use of Yoruba Language as a Medium of Instruction on Pupils Performance in Science and Mathematics

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The purpose of this study was to find out the effects of the use of Yoruba language as a medium of instruction on pupils performance in Science and Mathematics. The population of the study comprises all primary three schools pupils selected from primary schools in Ibadan, Oyo State. The sample for this study were 40 participants selected from the population. The sampling technique for this study was multi-stage technique. The instrument used for data collection was Academic Performance Achievement Test (APAT). The instrument was validated by researcher’s supervisor and other lecturers in the Department for content and face validly. All suggestions and corrections made were effected. The reliability of the instrument was carried out using the test-retest method. A total of 10 pupils from St Michael Primary School, Iyana Iba Lagos who were not part of the population were selected for reliability test. Data collected from the first week administration of the instrument was correlated with the first week questionnaire. The two data collected was analysed with Pearson’s Product Moment Correlation Coefficients [PPMCC] which yielded 0.84 coefficient after computation. Researcher with four assistants administered the Academic performance Achievement test (APAT) to the two groups before the treatment. The experimental group was exposed to four weeks teaching in Yoruba language while the control group was not be expose to any treatment. Data collected was analysed with frequency counts and simple percentage for demographic data of respondents while the inferential statistics of t-test was used to test all the stated hypothesis at 0.05 level of significance. Findings from the study revealed that the use of Yoruba language as a medium of instruction had effect on pupil’s performance in Science, Mathematics in primary schools in Oyo State. The study also found gender difference on the effect of the use of Yoruba language as a medium of instruction on pupil’s performance in Science and Mathematics in primary schools in Oyo state. It was recommended that Teachers in primary school s in Oyo State should use the pupil’s mother tongue to teach science based subjects, and Mathematics and should give equal right to both females and male to learn Science and Mathematics in their mother tongue without fear, favour or discrimination.

Mainstreaming Environmental Education in the School and Teacher Education Curriculum in Zambia

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Environmental Education (EE) as a subject or field of specialization is still in its infancy in the curriculum both at teacher training and school teaching levels in Zambia. The curriculum at both levels does not provide coverage on EE as the subject is treated as a cross-cutting issue. At primary and secondary school levels there are very few experts trained in EE as a discipline. Since EE is integrated in subject teaching, issues affecting the environment are taught at the discretion of a teacher. Teaching EE is still a challenge on the part of teachers in schools in Zambia. Pupils’ understanding of EE in sampled schools was still at very low ebb. There were variations in responses between pupils coming from the low, middle and high social class areas on issues of the environment. As the Ministry of Education in Zambia is reviewing the school and teacher education curriculum, EE should be broadened in scope in order to contribute to the pupil’s overall development as well as the promotion of education for sustainable development at national level. In order to foster transformative and strong sustainability, EE under the current integrated approach is rather conservative and weak in terms of sustainability. If the curriculum is overloaded, curriculum experts should identify and remove the dead wood from the curriculum and replace it with EE. To strengthen EE in the schools and teacher education curriculum, the Ministry of Education should consider retraining teachers in appropriate methodologies in EE for sustainable development as well as developing a citizenry that is conscious and motivated to develop and manage its own environment in a sustainable manner.

Strategies for Forming the Wh-Interrogative in Najdi Arabic

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This paper examines the four strategies for forming the wh-interrogative described by Aoun, Benmamoun, and Choeiri (2010): the gap strategy, the resumptive strategy, the class II resumptive strategy, and the in-situ strategy in the Najdi Arabic dialect. Aoun et al. (2010) investigated these strategies in standard Arabic and Lebanese Arabic. Some Arabic dialects use a subset of these strategies, while others use all four, at least in specific contexts. The contribution of this paper is to shed light on how Najdi Arabic employs these strategies in forming wh-interrogatives in terms of their syntactic properties. With respect to the distribution of wh-interrogatives into arguments and adjuncts, all argumental wh-interrogatives can be utilized in the gap, the class II resumptive, and the in-situ strategies, while a subset can be used in the resumptive strategy. On the other hand, all adjunct wh-interrogatives are employed in the gap and in-situ strategies, but only one selective adjunct wh-word can be applied in the resumptive strategy and the class II resumptive strategy.

Challenges and Prospects of Education in Correctional Facilities in Zambia: A study of Selected Prisons

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The study explored the challenges and prospects of education in correctional facilities in Zambia and examined its inclusiveness. Prisons Act, Chapter 97 of the Laws of Zambia states that every prisoner has the right to education and library facilities. Currently, most Prisoners are deprived of the right to education and library facilities. This means that there is lack of inclusive education in prison and yet the Zambian Law clearly mandates prison authorities to provide education to all prisoners. If this problem is not addressed, prisoners would continue to be marginalized in the face of well documented human rights opportunities.

The study was qualitative and used embedded case study approach with more than one unit of analysis; one correctional centre in Lusaka and two correctional facilities in Central province were used for both male and female inmates. The sample drawn using homogeneous purposive sampling involved 31 student prisoners; 3 senior officers from NGOs, 13 prison staff, 1 senior officer from Ministry of Home Affairs – 1 senior officer from MoGE and 1 from TEVETA giving the total of 44 respondents. Data was coded and categorized into themes. The findings indicated that education was not inclusive due to many challenges such as inadequate teaching, learning, and training materials and inadequate funding from government. There are prospects for education for prisoners, through government support in terms of funding though not adequate, the Prisons ACT chapter 97 mandating prisons to offer education, ECZ providing examinations, NGO and TEVETA support. The study revealed that prison education could be made more inclusive through collaborative support of Government and NGOs. The Ministry of Home Affairs should have clear policy guide lines on prison education. In view of the findings, the study recommended that government should increase budget allocation to prison education and implement prison education policy; Ministry of Education should take responsibility of prison education and collaborate with NGOs supporting prison education.

Developing the Power of the People’s Union – A Great Motion for Social-Economic Development in Vietnam Today

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Looking at the movement and development of social history, the power of great solidarity plays a significant role, and that role is vividly shown in the practice of human activities. By summarizing practice and experience, assessing the role of great solidarity has been affirmed by the Communist Party of Vietnam: “Great national unity is the strategic line of the Vietnamese revolution, the enormous resources and resources in the construction and defense of the Fatherland”(Communist Party of Vietnam, 2016, pp. 158-159). With that remark, the Party has adequately assessed the strength of great solidarity and made great solidarity a long-term strategy for socio-economic development. Within the scope of this article, the author focuses on analyzing the role as the driving force of promoting the strength of great solidarity for the socio-economic development in Vietnam today in three essential aspects: (1) the driving force for the development economy; (2) motivation for socio-cultural development; (3) the driving force to stabilize the political situation and perfect the political system.

Students’ Perceptions towards English Learning Applications

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This study was conducted to find out students’ perceptions towards English learning applications at Tay Do University. The questionnaire and interview were used as tools to obtain information from the participants in this study who were thirty students from many majors of Tay Do University. The survey used Google forms to get data and information on the Internet through questionnaires. Research resulted showed that students perceived the benefits of English learning apps. In addition, in the process of using the application to learn English, students also felt the positive aspects as well as the limitations of the application. And from the research results, there are also some ideas on how to search, choose as well as how to use the applications to learn English effectively, appropriately and optimally for students.

The Impact of Leadership Style on Teachers’ Organizational Commitment

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The study explores how transformational and transactional leadership styles affect teachers’ commitment in aspects of affective dedication, normative commitment, and continuance commitment. The research utilized the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (MLQ) to assess leadership styles of the 80 surveyed high school teachers. The results indicated that transformational and transactional leadership styles only enhanced the emotional attachment teachers have towards the school. Neither transformational nor transactional leadership styles could predict the moral obligation to stay in the school and weigh the benefits of leaving the school. It was recommended that organizational management encourage and inspire teachers through motivation to increase their level of commitment. School leaders and supervisors should prioritize regular leadership training and seminars for effective management to boost teacher commitment.

An Assessment of Safety and Health Issues in Selected Students’ Boarding Houses of Lusaka City

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Safety and health management in learning environments is a growing concern in globally. According to United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF, 2009) academic attainment is regarded as a decisive factor that determines educational quality. Therefore, in pursuing such academic attainment, students have the right to learn in a safe and healthy environment. Safety and health in class rooms, student boarding houses or hostels and other learning spaces should be taken care of if learning is to be meaningful. With reference to the argument by UNICEF, this paper explored safety and health issues in selected students’ boarding houses of Lusaka city. Using purposive and simple random sampling, a sample of 25 students living in boarding houses were randomly selected. Data was collected using unstructured interviews and focus group discussion. Data collected was analyzed using descriptive statistics and thematic analysis. This paper established that the selected boarding houses in Lusaka city faced many safety and health challenges such as poor ventilation, fire safety, overcrowding, poor sanitary infrastructure, among others. This study established that as much as the selected boarding houses had put in place safety and health measures, there were still outstanding safety and health concerns. The study recommended that landlords for boarding houses could reduce the number of students in the boarding house to avoid overcrowding. Boarding houses owners should also ensure that waste is collected on regular basis and that boarding house owners to build more sanitary facilities and improve on the sanitation of the boarding house.

Reinforcing Teacher’s Instructional Capability: Web-Designing

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Coronavirus has made the educational system around the world paralyzed, including in Aceh,
Indonesia. The only technique left to manage the teaching-learning process now is by attempting
online learning. This study aims at testing the teachers’ in Nagan Raya in concern to their ability in
web design. This study was carried out in quantitative approach; single group experimental design
where 15 teachers involved in this study as the sample. In the pretest, they were given 10 questions
to see their understanding in web design. Later, after 4 months of treatment, they were given posttest to see their progress. The data collection was clearly done through test: pretest and post-test.
And the data were analyzed using Normality test and T-test in order to test the hypothesis. The
result shows that there is increase in the teachers’ knowledge in relation to web design knowledge.
The score before the treatment was only 38.3 and it increased to 79.3 after the treatment. There is
score inclination for 41.6. additionlly, the t-test result is 4.041 which is still within the critical area,
and conclusively, this proves that there is a significant difference to th teachers’ web design
knowledge before and after the treatment. The implication from the result is that it is important to
host a program to train teachers on how to develop web design because during this pandemic,
websites have been the main sources for learning.

Increasing Multilingual First-Grade Learners’ Online Engagement through Pedagogical Translanguaging

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Engagement is essential to any learning. Engagement allows learners to increase their knowledge,
demonstrate that they have mastered the material. However, language differences are one of the
reasons that prevent learners from actively engaging in online synchronous classes. Specifically, in
the case of multilingual learners, adjustments in the delivery of instruction brought about by the
pandemic present an additional barrier as communication strategies vary between online and faceto-face contact. Thus, this classroom action research aimed to address this gap by employing
pedagogical translanguaging in Mother Tongue-Ilokano classes. Through observations, the
researcher analyzed the translanguaging behaviors of first-graders and outlined a pedagogical
translanguaging approach. Through a Learners’ Online Engagement Rating Scale, the researcher
observed the development in the online engagement of his first graders during the utilization of
pedagogical translanguaging. Considering the observations made before and after employing
pedagogical translanguaging, it can be concluded that pedagogical translanguaging can increase the
online engagement of Multilingual First-Grade Learners. With this finding, employing pedagogical
translanguaging in multilingual classes is recommended. Aside from increasing online engagement,
other benefits of pedagogical translanguaging such as increasing scores, are also suggested.