Influence of parental assessment culture on primary school pupils’ academic performance in english language and social studies in Benue State - Nigeria

Abstract

The study examined the assessment of availability, adequacy, and utilisation of information and communication technology (ICT) in universities in South-West, Nigeria. The ex-post facto design was adopted, to collect information in which three states and three federal universities were purposively selected from South- Western, Nigeria. One hundred students and ten lecturers were randomly selected from each of the three federal universities in the zone. Two validated instruments: Information and Communication Technology Facilities Checklist (ICTFC) and Lecturers’ Questionnaire (LQ, r = 0.82) were used for data collection. Data collected were analysed using descriptive statistics. Between 84% and 100% of the respondents indicated that ICT facilities were available, while between 85% and 100% of them indicated that they were inadequate. The level of utilisation of the ICT facilities is low as indicated by 57%o to 100% of the respondents. Irregular power supply 100%, poor funding 90% and lack of internet facilities 83.33%, were identified as some of the major constraints militating against the use of ICT facilities. It was, therefore, recommended that there should be adequate provision of ICT facilities and resources in our tertiary institutions. The National Universities Commission (NUC) should of a necessity review the course contents of university education, to compulsorily incorporate ICT utilisation as a standard for teaching and learning, while university authorities should support lecturers to utilise ICT. There is increasing need for parents' active participation in the assessment of their children at home. This study investigated the influence of parental assessment culture on primary school pupils' academic performance in English and Social Studies in Benue State. Three research questions were developed for the study, which is a survey and correlation study. A sample of200primary six pupils from six schools was randomly selected using the hat and draw procedure. The six primary schools were also selected using random sampling technique. Rating scale and English and Social Studies achievement tests were used for data collection. Descriptive statistics and Pearson moment correlation were used as statistical tools for data analysis. The findings revealed that parents have low level of assessment culture in evaluating academic works of their primary school children. There was low positive correlation between parental assessment culture and pupils' academic performance in English Studies (r = .042, p= .556), whereas, parents assessment culture was positively related to pupils' performance in Social Studies (r = .780, p=.010). It is recommended, among others, that parents should cultivate the culture of assessing their children academic activities at home, and provide feedback to the school on children's academic behaviours at home. facilities while teaching.