EFFECT OF PEER COLLABORATION ON SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS’ ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT IN ORGANIC CHEMISTRY IN OGBIA LOCAL GOVERNMENT AREA, BAYELSA STATE

Abstract The study investigated the effect of peer collaboration on secondary school students’ academic achievement in organic chemistry in Ogbia Local Government Area, Bayelsa State. The poor achievement of students in organic chemistry spurred the need to undertake this study, the effect of teaching strategy on organic chemistry students’ achievement in Alkanes at senior secondary schools. Two research questions guided the study and were answered using mean and variance on the other hand two null hypotheses were formulated and tested at 0.05 level of significant using independent t-test. Review of related literature was done under conceptual framework, theoretical framework, review of empirical studies and the summary of review of literature. The reviewed literature the retrieved among other things that some studies had been carried out in other subject areas to find out the effect of teaching methods on senior secondary school students. Quasi-experimental design of pre-test post-test non-equivalent group design was adopted for the study. The target population of the study was the all coeducational senior secondary 2 chemistry students in Ogbia Local Government Area of Bayelsa State. Instrument called Organic Chemistry Achievement Test (OCAT) was used for data collection. Before teaching, pretest was administered on the research subjects to find out the initial achievement level and posttest was administered after the treatment for analysis. The two groups were comparable because a non significant difference existed between their present mean score. Data that were obtained were subjected for statistical analysis. Mean and variance were used to answer the research questions while independent t-test was used to test the null hypothesis. The result of the analysis indicated that students taught chemistry with peer collaboration instructional strategy of teaching method achieved more than their conventional method. Based on the findings of this study, the following recommendations were made based on the findings of the study. Chemistry teachers should be encouraged to use peer collaboration instructional strategies when teaching Alkanes concepts in chemistry.