INVESTIGATION ON THE EFFECT OF INTEGRATED GROUP BASED MASTERY LEARNING MODEL ON SOCIAL STUDIES STUDENT ACHIEVEMENT
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- 1-5 Chapters
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- Reference Style: APA
- Recommended for : Student Researchers
- NGN 3000
Background of the study
Recent socio-political and economic developments in the world and within nations have resulted in shifts in educational objectives and increased obstacles for social studies. Schools are expected to provide students with not just fundamental understanding of social studies subject, but also higher cognitive abilities such as problem solving and critical thinking, which allow for self-development and continual learning. To address these issues, there is a shift away from the behaviourist technique of direct instruction, such as the lecture method, note copying, and dictations, in which the learner is given material to memorise and regurgitate.
According to Mehar and Rana (2016), changes in educational objectives continue to affect Social Studies as a field. History, Economics, Government, and Geography were taught as independent disciplines in the twentieth century, with a list of information to memorize. Students' learning had to be examined and taught as an integrated subject as educational results changed. The emphasis has shifted from learning as acquisition of facts to learning as utilization of facts; from learning as memorization (from Geography and History texts) to learning as a process of discovering important relationships and principles inductively; and from learning for the sake of learning to learning as a way of inquiring and thinking according to Social Science processes. This can only be accomplished through the mastery learning technique.
Social studies as a discipline is a relatively new addition to the global curriculum. The notion of social studies was initially conceived in the United States in 1916 by the committee on social studies of the National Education Association's commission on the restructuring of secondary education (Udo and Udofia 2015). Later in the 1930s, social studies was brought into Europe, particularly in the United Kingdom, as a result of exceptional excitement to modify the traditional curriculum to satisfy the demands of society. Between 1950 and 1956, the topic had spread to numerous African countries. The new independent African states had to reorganise their national policies in order to fulfil their expected duties as independent nations within the international community of nations. The adoption of the National Policy on Education, generally known as the 6-3-3-4 system, in 1977 accelerated the growth of social studies in secondary schools in Nigeria. Two important causes contributed to this remarkable improvement. The first was that, beginning in 1976, the Universal Elementary Education (UPE) programme made social studies the sole social science topic taught in primary schools. The second aspect was the inclusion of social studies as a basic subject in junior high school. This has raised students' and instructors' understanding of the importance of social studies, particularly as it relates to the implementation of the 6-3-3-4 educational system.
In order to implement the national policy on education, government at all levels became more interested in the schooling process in terms of educational outcomes, learning activities, instructional resources, instructional strategies and evaluation procedures. In view of this, emphasis has been on the need to:
- make educational activities centre on the learner for maximum self-development and self-fulfillment.
- structure the educational system to develop the practice of self -learning (FRN, 2004). The implication of these for classroom teachers is that, they should develop a teaching approach which encourages the learners to participate in the learning processes.
Despite the efforts of Government in restructuring the educational system to develop the practice of self-learning, the dominant approach to instruction in schools has been the expository type especially since the inception of western education in Nigeria in 1843. Other methods of instruction were later introduced into the learning processes. For instance, since 1960, curriculum planners have emphasized the inquiry approach by claiming that carrying out investigations is the most promising method by which students will master inquiry skills and become literate in social studies (Schwab, 1963; Yager & Lutz, 1994). Even at that, it cannot be said that schools have done well in developing such skills in the learners.
Quite a number of studies have been conducted to investigate the causes of students’ under achievement in Junior Secondary Social Studies (Wang, Schwab, Fenn and Chang 2018) and the most reoccurring factor in all is the inadequate teaching method used by Social Studies teachers.
Consequently, learners’ individual needs, preferences and interest cannot be met by most strategies utilized in the traditional, expository method of teaching. This is one of the reasons the researcher is interested in trying out other method such as mastery learning strategy. If the objectives of Social Studies education are to be met, then the need to look for an alternative teaching paradigm in the form of an improved and effective teaching strategy that is result oriented becomes necessary.
Social Studies as a school subject introduced by the Federal Government was to help students acquire basic social knowledge, positive attitudes, values and social skills needed to make the students functional and responsible citizens and contributing members of the society. It provides knowledge, skills and attitude that enable learners understand their physical and social environment in order to act or behave as responsible citizens. It prepares students to live in a global and culturally diverse world, as well as keep pace with rapid development in electronically and technologically changing world, (Martorella, 1996). It involves person with group and group with group. It is a study of man’s relationship with his environment, how environment affects man and how man in turn influences his environment.
The teaching of social studies is therefore an activity that involves both the teacher and the learner. The purpose of teaching is to ensure that learning takes place. While learning involves a behavioural change in the learner, social studies teaching involves the transmission of the relevant body of knowledge, attitudes, manner, dispositions, skills and values that enable the individual to survive in a growing and dynamic society.
Adeyemi (2007) defines teaching of social studies as a process of facilitating student learning through a proper management by the teacher of the inter-relationships among the students’ interest, the content for learning and the methods and materials he or she intends to use in the teaching and learning of the content materials. It may involve giving instruction to somebody on knowledge, skills and attitudes with the intention that the person will be able to know the information or to do something or act in a particular way that is compatible with the instruction. We know that the person the instruction is given to may be a learner, a pupil, a student or a trainee. The means employed by the teacher to pass information to the learner would determine ultimately, if he or she is teaching.
According to Lynn, Douglas and Gerald (2009), Mastery Learning is an instructional process that provides students with multiple opportunities to demonstrate content mastery. Initial instruction is presented at a fast pace to engage all learners. Students who do not demonstrate mastery are given additional instruction specifically designed to correct their misunderstandings. Re-teaching should involve strategies that are different from the original instructional methods. For example, if the original material was presented in a lecture format with visuals, the re-teaching process might involve hands-on activities and cooperative learning strategies. A retest is later given to these students to allow them to demonstrate mastery.
The teacher must be an effective communicator who thoroughly processes his information of social studies content and presents it in an orderly and comprehensive manner. There must be an established feedback mechanism so as to enable correction of lapses in instructional methods which can thus bring about improvement in the teaching and learning of Social Studies.
Summarily, to instruct for mastery the following guideline are to be followed:
- Clearly state the objectives representing the purpose of the subject
- The curriculum is divided into relatively small learning units, each with modelling, practice, formative evaluation; re-teaching, reinforcement, and summative evaluation included.
- Each unit is preceded by brief diagnostic tests, formative assessments.
The results of formative tests are used to provide supplementary instruction, or corrective activities to help the learner overcome problems.
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