EFFICACY OF MULTIMEDIA INSTRUCTIONAL RESOURCES ON STUDENTS ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT AND RETENTION IN BIOLOGY IN IBENO LGA

This study examined the efficacy of multimedia instructional resources on students’ academic achievement and retention in Biology in Ibeno Local Government Area. Three research questions and three null hypotheses were formulated to guide the study. Quasi-experimental design was adopted. The population of the study consisted of two five hundred and fifty (550) Senior Secondary One (SS1) Biology students in the one public secondary schools in the study area. A sample size of 127 SS1 biology students was used for the study. Simple random sampling technique was used in selecting section A-D of the SS1 class co-educational secondary schools and in each of the selected schools, intact class of SS1 biology students was used for the study. The instruments were validated by an expert in Measurement and Evaluation in the Department of Science Education, The instrument used for data collection were Biology Performance Test (BPT) and Biology Retention Test (BRT) with reliability coefficient of 0.88 obtained using Kuder Richardson Formula KR-21. Data were analyzed using mean and standard deviation to answer research questions and independent t-test for hypotheses formulated at .05 level of significance. Findings showed that there is a significant difference in the mean achievement scores of students’ in Biology when taught the concept of excretory system using audio-visuals and graphics multimedia instructional resources. (p-cal. = .000; @ p < .05). It was also revealed that there is a significant difference in the mean retention scores of students’ in Biology when taught the concept of excretory system using audio-visuals and graphics multimedia instructional resources. (p-cal. = .000; @ p < .05. and it was revealed that there is no significant difference in the mean achievement scores of male and female students’ in Biology when taught the concept of excretory system using audio-visuals (p-cal. = .959; @ p