41312014 lIorin Journal of Education ILC)RIN J()URNAL ()F EDUCATIC)N OPEN JOURNAL FONT SIZE HOME ABOUT LOGIN REGISTER SEARCH SYSTEMS CURRENT ARCHIVES UNILORIN JOURNALS Journal Help HOllie> Ilorin Journal of Education USER ILORIN JOURNAL OF usernamel Password I-----~ EDUCATION o Remember me Ilorin Journal of Educat ion (JJE) is a scholarly, referred, yearly journal ~ published by the Faculty of Education, University of Ilorin, !lorin, Nigeria, since November 1978. The Journal has decided to go online in JOURNAL order to make it a stronger fonun for the international exchange of CONTENT information on the current theory, research, development, and practice Search of education. Consequently, articles are regularly accepted for publication consideration. II-A-II----l'- Search I Browse By Issue By Author By'r,lk Other Journals ISSN:OI89-6636 https:/Ivwm.unilorin.edu.ng/ejournals/index.phplije 1/1 UNIVERSITY OF IBADAN LIBRARY 41312014 Vol 29 (2010) IL()RIN J()URNAL ()F EDUCATIC}N FONT SIZE OPEN JOURNALHOME ABOUT LOG fN REGISTER SEARCH SYSTEMS CURRENT ARCHIVES UNILORIN JOURNALS flome > Current> Vol 19 (2{J10) USER VOL 29 (2010) l)sernamel Password 1----- o Remember me TABLE OF CONTENTS ~ ARTICLES JOUKNAL CONTENT PERCEPTION OF PERSONALITY DISORDER FULL TEXT (I'DF) AMONG UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS OF Search SELECTED UNIVERSITIES IN OOUN STATE, NIGERIA I All A.o. LASODE Search I GENDER-BIAS AND HUMAN RESOURCES FULL TEXT (PDF) DEVELOPMENT. SOME MEASUREMENT Browse CONSIDERATIONS J. H. NENTY By IssueBy Author ANALYSIS OF NATIONAL EXAMINATIONS FULL TEXT (PDF) By'l!!k COUNCIL JUNIOR SCHOOL CERTIFICATE Other Journals EXAMINATION QUESTIONS IN TWO CORE SUBJECTS E. A. Okwilagwe. C. C. Nwazota PERCEIVED INFLUFNCESOF WORK- FULL TEXT (PDF) RELAT ED VARIABI ES ONST RESS AND COPING~lRATEJESBY ACADEMIC STAFF OF ONIVERSITYOF IBADAN K. 0. OM aLA IVaN EFFEcr OF PERSONALlZED SYSTEM OF FULL TEXT (PDF) iNSTRUCTION ON SENlOR SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTSi PERFORIv1ANCE IN MATHEMATICS Ii. 0. aWOLABJ, /vi. 0. ADERINTO ISSN: 0189-6636 https:llwIm,unilorin,edu,ng/ejoutnaislindex.phplijelissue/current 1/1 UNIVERSITY OF IBADAN LIBRARY https://www.unilorin.edu.ng/ejournals/index.php/ije/ article/download/273/162.UNIVERSITY OF IBADAN LIBRARY llorin Journal of Education, Vol. 29 December; 2010 ANALYSIS OF NATIONAL EXAMINATIONS COUNCILJ1]NIOR SCHOOL CERTIFICATE EXAMINATION QUESTIONS IN TWO CO RE SUBJECTS Okwilagwe, E. A. Institute of Education, University of Ibadan, Ibadan. & Nwazota, C. C. International Centre for Educational Evaluation University of Ibadan, Ibadan. Abstract The study is an analysis of content coverage of Junior School Certificate Examination Syllabi by National Examinations Council Papers in Two core Subject. The extent to which itema on the test represent Bloomis Taxonomy of Educational Objectives (cognitive domain) was also ana lysed. The ex- post-facto research design was adopted in the study. Examination syllabi for Social Studies and Integrated Science and question papers for a three year period were collected and ana lysed using descriptive statistics. Findings indicated that NECO JSCE Integrated Science and Social Studies questions cover between 50% and 60% of the examination syllabi. Most of {he areas not adequately covered were very relevant to everyday life. Generally, Social Studies multiple choice items were easy but in 2001 and 2003 the essay items were difficult as 33% and 40% were 'at the application level respectively. Integrated Science multiple choice questions and essay questions for 2004 were difficult as they covered 30% and 46% application level respectively. In view of the findings, it was suggested that to meet the standard of NEeo questions, the subject teachers should develop in students the skills and strategies for answering higher order questions to keep pace with the changing patterns of questions presentation. Key words: National Examinations Council, Junior Secondary School Certificate Examination, Standard, Bloomfs Taxonomy of Educational Objectives, Cognitive domain. - 27- UNIVERSITY OF IBADAN LIBRARY Okwilagwe, EA. & Nwazota, CC Introduction Examinations, whether written or oral, have been identified by educational institutions, examination bodies and other establishments providing training, as the best means of determining the competence of a person after having been exposed to a set of training experiences.According to Oberneata (1999 & 2000), test items used for this purpose, usually take time to organise because they should possess acceptable level of validity and reliability as well as permit a high degree of usability. In addition, the items must be developed by experts in the field from the syllabus, supposed to have been covered for a stated period of time by s students. But, do all these efforts and precautionary measures make these items faultless or perfect? In an earlier development, Soriyan (1979) maintained that developing and reviewing examination syllabus involves enormous thinking and energy. To ensure that the syllabus produced is appropriate, he suggested that a group of people consisting of education experts members of the National Working Team, the International Panel and Examination Committee should work together until a final copy of the syllabus is produced. Against what is standard compared? Since standard ismaintaining a certain level of acceptability of the quality of a thing using some criteria (Okwilagwe, 2009), examination bodies like Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JA.MB) and West African Examinations Council (WAEC) may have so much in common with NECO in terms of item development even though the purposes are different. WAEC and NECO develop items that are used for certification and as such, for comparison of their standards Certainly, there are criteria from WAEC that can be used as yardstick for the analysis. In April 1966 for instance, the Certificate Awarding Committee of WAEC, requested that the Test Development and Research Office (TEDRO) carry out a study on the standard ofWASC papers over a period of at least five years (1960-65). This exercise was basically to analyse the WAEC questions during the stated period. Making reference to the above Commission, Soriyan (1968) presenting his findings under two headings: estandard of the Examination Papers as Determined by the Standard of Student sf Performancei, and eStandard of the Examination Papers as Determined by Bloomis Taxonomy of Educational Objectives in the Cognitive Dornaini, made the following recommendations to the Council. (i) That, corrunissioned subject specialists should look into the intellectual abilities involved in their subjects and make sure that all the requirements and skills are covered by their questions; and (ii) they should also decide on the proportions of the abilities that are to be represented. -28- UNIVERSITY OF IBADAN LIBRARY ilorin Journal of Educauon, VoL 29 December; 2010 He further suggested that the procedure should involve the preparation of individual subjects table of specification by the commissioned item writers, editing of the set questions by subject officers, allowing the moderating committee of -"::.:..";.:-=,,,.,,.~bject experts to moderate them and establish statistical characteristics of difficulty -and discriminating powers, especially for multiple choice items. These processes, no doubt, are the basics when developing standard questions that are used in any external examination. It is, therefore, expected that every examination body should engage in these processes before any examination is taken by candidates. He, however, expressed reservation over the age-long practice of candidates having to make a choice of questions in essay tests. His fears were hinged on maintaining test fairness. He contended that it is difficult, if not impossible, to compare candidates! performance in one question with that of another and went further to say that two questions which seem equal in strength may not after all be, since one may be measuring a higher cognitive ability than the other. Soriyan (1968), provided a solution to this challenge by explaining that studentfs scores on two different objective questions can only be equated if their means are not significantly different, otherwise, there was no basis for making such comparison. This contribution provided an avenue for the improvement of the standard ofWAEC question papers. Another issue which needs to be focused on in the NECO JSCE questions being analysed is the educational goals highlighted by the National Policy on Education (FGN, 2004) as it concerns the Junior Secondary School. The Universal Basic Education (UBE) programme which was launched in 1999 by the government of the Federal Republic of Nigeria amed to eradicate illiteracy, ignorance and poverty as well as stimulate and accelerate national development, political consciousness and national integration. The scope ofUBE as contained in its manual is three-fold and covers provision of prograrnmes and initiatives for earl y childhood education and development; six-year primary education; and three- year junior secondary education. The UBE bill was signed into law on the 261h of Act makes primary and junior secondary education free and compulsory for all children within the target population and also guarantees regular Federal Government funding of the programme in federal government schools. The Act also provides for the establishment of the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEq to co-ordinate the implementation of the programme at the national level. Though, the junior secondary school section in all federal government schools was abolished by the then Minister of Education Dr Chinwe Obaji in 2004 and resuscitated in 2009, the junior secondary school which is the main area of focus ofthis study still has its objectives intact. It is both prevocational and academic in nature. In specific terms, the objectives to JSS are encapsulated as: - 29- UNIVERSITY OF IBADAN LIBRARY Okwilagwe, E.A. & Nwazota, c.c. 0) inspiring the students with a desire for self-improvement and achievement of excellence; (ii) raising a generation of people who can think for themselves, respect the views and feelings of others, respect dignity of labour, appreciate those values specified under our broad national goals and live as good citizens; and (iii) providing technical knowledge and vocational skills necessary for agricultural, industrial, commercial and economic development. The subjects taught at JSS are such that will enable the students to acquire further knowledge and skills (FGN, 2004). In addition, the students who complete JSS are to be streamed into; (i) the senior secondary school; (ii) the technical college; (ill) in out-of-schools vocational training centres; and (iv) apprenticeship scheme. An important aspect of this streaming the Policy further stated is that eit will be based on the results of a final test or examination to determine the academic ability, aptitude and vocational interest of the students to ensure appropriate placement. In view of this, the questions for the final examinations, therefore, must be valid and reliable to achieve the above set purpose. According to Obemeata (2000) and Anastasi & Urbina (1997), the validity of a test is the degree to which the test actual Iy measures what it purports to measure, while reliability is the precision or the consistency with which a test instrument measures a sample of behaviours (Ayodele,Adegbile &Adewale, 2(03). Validity is the most important pre-condition when developing test items. As such, the validity of a test score according to American Education Research Association as cited by Cizek (2007) is the degree to which accumulated evidence and theory support specific interpretations of test scores entailed by proposed uses of a test. In view of this, the test should sample wide content area as well as have good and reasonable difficulty and discriminating indices. Also, the content (examination syllabus) should guide students in clear terms as to what is expected of them. To determine the academic ability of students, the six categories of the Blooms taxonomy of educational objectives in the cognitive domain is often used as a guide. In his study, Sari yan (1968) discovered that there is a parallel relationship between the standard ofWAEC examination questions and Bloornis Taxonomy of Educational Objectives. This direct link should also reflect in the question papers used in NECO examinations, especially as it is a relative! y new examination body. Since NECO was established with an indigenous outlook both in character and operation, the expectations of the stakeholders in - 30- UNIVERSITY OF IBADAN LIBRARY l lortn Journal of Education. Vol. 29 December; 2010 education is that the standard of its certificate should be-better than those ot omer examination bodies. More so, that the Council is supposed to be operating.within J it! •.·. local context and is accessible to adequate information-on the educational-needs of the nation. The validity of NECO certificates definitel y can be determined by ascertaining the quality of the item characteristics ofits-examination-papers, especial! y in the core subjects, two of which are the focus of this study-c. ."",,, .. National Examinations Council (NECO), as a relatively young examination body, has been conducting Junior Secondary School Certificate Examination for federal govemment colleges, a few States of the federation and some allied institutions since the mid -19005 (FGN, 2004). The expectation of the standard of NECO questions is that it should be high, as this is crucial to the quality of the certificate itawards. It therefore became imperative that a study be carried out to critically analyse the content coverage of the questions that led to the award of the JSC specifically, with a view to finding out their strengths and weaknesses and make recommendations that will further improve the standard of the whole process of examining and certificate award by NECO. Statement of the Problem In one of the several efforts to prove its worth and to achieve the mandate given to it, NECO instituted a question and answer forum, where the public was allowed to send in questions and contributions concerning its activities. TIle outcome of the meeting was that NECO is an untested examination body which needs to standardise its certificates. In order to ascertain, therefore, the worth of its certificates, this study was designed to anal yse NECO JSCE item in Social Studies and Integrated Science. Research Questions The following questions guided the study: 1. To what extent do NECO JSCE questions between 2001-2004 represent the Social Studies and Integrated Science syllabi? 2. At what levels of Bloomis Taxonomy of Educational Objectives were questions used in 2001-2004 Social Studies and Integrated Science operating? Methodology The ex-post-facto design was adopted in this study. It involved mostly documentary analysis of JSCE questions in the two core subjects (Integrated SCience and Social studies) for the three year period, the national JSCE syllabuses and the schemes of work for JSCE for the two core subjects under anal ysis. - 31 - UNIVERSITY OF IBADAN LIBRARY Okwilagwe, E.A. & Nwazota, (..( . There was no formal construction of research instruments rather the 2001, 2003 and 2004 NECO JSCE question papers in the two core subjects were obtained and tables of specifications were produced from the contents covered by items on each subject. These were used to determine the content coverage of NECO items. Documentary analysis of data was performed on the exam ination syllabus, question papers, table of specification, were studied and the pieces offactual information to answer research question one. The cognitive level of each of the items was also classfied to the appropriate thinking level of the first three cognitive domains of Bloornes Taxonomy of Educational Objectives meant for this level of education and age of the learners: these are knowledge, comprehension and application levels. Analysis of each of the test items under these categories provided answer to research question two. Results Tables 1a - 1d present the distribution pattern of the content coverage of the examination syllabi by NECO questions in the two core subjects from 2001 - 2004. SIN (a) Topics with the highest Year and Percentage of Questions number of item; 2001 2003 200t 1 Common Heritage and Nat ional Symbol. 27(34%) 24(30%) 14(18%) 2 Educational Institutions. 24(30%) 20(25%) 30(38%) 3 Nigerian cultural patterns and their 9(12%) 15(21%) 19(24%) historical origin. 4 National Economic life 5(6%) 11(14%) 7(9%) 5 Social environment and civic 5(6%) 3(4%) 3(4%) responsibilities. (b) Topics with few items 2001 2003 2004 6 Legal and Political institutions 3(4%) 3(4%) 2(3%) 7 Socializat ion, its agencies and processes. 3(4%) 1(2%) 3(4%) 8 Science and Technology 2(3%) 2(3%) 1(1%) 9 World Transport and Communication. 2(3%) 1(2%) 1(1%) (c) Topics with no item 2001 ZOO] 200-1 LO Physical features and natural resources. 0% 0% 0% 11 Co-operation and conflict 0% 0% 0% 12 Some sub-topics under: Institutions, 0% 0% 0% Nigerian cultural patterns and their historical origins, Technology, Origin of man, National economic life, The world and its people, and World Transport and Communication. Total 80(100%) ::;0(100%) 80(HlO%) - 32- UNIVERSITY OF IBADAN LIBRARY tlorin Journal of Education, Vol. 29 December, 2010 ""'.,"' e • -; •• ~. -". Results in Tables Ia-b show that the ..fu;st;;me high1¥iN'~W6pm~in item ,•...-_.- -',,' ." representation in Social Studies ar~.J!l}.@.g§$tiG!!af,.ji¥Ji,mfjHBsi.f24-38%a)nd _,eCommon Heritage and.National Sym~!&(l.§;;~m~ere followed closely ~~!;:~.-- . by eNigerian cultural patterns and their"hi'S'toricarorigmsf (r2~24%), eNational Economic Lifef (6-14%) and 'sodaie~6nfu~Iiti (~%J~'..-, The next group had one or two items set in the period are el.egal institutionf (3- 4%), Socialization, (2-4%); Science and Technology (1-3%) and World transport and communication (1-3%), At the other extreme, Table 1a also showed those topics which had no single item throughout the three-year period. They are ePhysical features and Natural resourcesi, eCo-operation and Conflictf, eOrigin of mani, eNational Economic Life.i e'The world and its people and lWorld Transport and Communication!' Tablelb: Contents Representation of Social Studies Essay Items from the Syllabus (2001-2004) SIN (a) Topics with the highest Year and Percentage of Questions number of essay items 2001 2003 2004 Physical features and natural 4(31%) 5(36%) 4(31%) resources. 2 National Economic life in Nigeria. 3(23%) 2(14%) 3(23%) 3 Social Environment 2(15%) 2(13%) 2(15%) 4 Nigeria cultural patterns and their Historical origins. 1.5(12%) 1.5( II %) 1(7%) 5 Educational Institutions. 1(7%) 1.5(10.5%) 1.5(12%) (b) Topics that are least represented 6 Socialization: [Is agencies and 0,5(4%) 1(7%) 0.5(4%) processes. 7 Civic rights and responsibilities. 0.5(4%) 0.5(4%) 0,5(4%) 8 World Transport and 0.5(4%) 0.5(4%) 0.5(4%) Communication. Total 13(100%) 14(100%) 13(100%) Table Ib shows that out of the twenty topics in the Social Studies examination syllabus, only five major topics had the highest number of essay items representation as follows ef'hysical features and Natural Resourcesf(31-36%), - 33 - UNIVERSITY OF IBADAN LIBRARY Okwilagwe, EA. & Nwazota, c.c. eNational Economic Life in Nigeria! (14-23%), eSocial environmenti (14-15%), elnstitutionsi (7-12%), and eCommon Heritage and National Symbolsf(7-12%). Also shown in Table lb are topics that had very low representation; e5ocializationf (4-7%), eCivic rights and responsibilities! (4%) and World transport and communication (4%). Table Ic: Contents Representation of NECO JSCE Integrated Science Multiple Choice Items (2001-2004) SIN (a) Topic high number of ~Y",e;;,:ar;:--:.:a.::n-,-d-=P,-,e:c:r-;;ce;,;;n~t:::a: