Effects Of Covid-19 Induced Schools’ Lockdown On Teaching And Learning Biology In Colleges Of Education In Delta State

ABSTRACT

This study investigated the effect of COVID-19 induced schools’ lockdown on teaching and learning Biology in Colleges of Education in Delta State. Three research questions guided the study.  A descriptive survey design was adopted for the study. The population of the study two hundred and thirty (230)Biology Education students in Colleges of Education in Delta State and Delta State College of Education Mosogar while the sample of the study comprised of one hundred (60) Biology Education students in Federal College of Education (Technical) Asaba, Delta State and Delta State College of Education Mosogar randomly selected to represent the entire population. The instrument used for data collection is a structured questionnaire, which was structured by the researcher and validated by two experts; one in Biology Education and one in Educational Measurement and Evaluation Department of Federal College of Education (Technical) Asaba. Sixty (60) copies of the validated instrument were administered on the selected Biology Education students in Federal College of Education (Technical) Asaba, Delta State and Delta State College of Education Mosogar by the researcher with the help of some staff and the researcher retrieved 56  instruments and analyzed using mean statistics. On the basis of the analysis, the study found among others that Covid-19 induced schools lockdown negatively influenced lecturers’ attitude towards the use of e-learning materials, lecturers’ attitude towards the use of e-learning materials and students’ academic achievement in biology in Colleges of Education in Delta State. Based on the findings, it was recommended among others that lecturers should make the use of e-learning materials and students should be encouraged to develop good reading habit so as to improve the teaching and learning of Biology.

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

Background to the Study

The unexpected outbreak of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has affected almost every sector, including the higher education institutions around the world (Adedoyin & Soykan, 2020). During this critical moment of the COVID-19 pandemic, most of the countries around the world shifted to online teaching (Bokayev, 2021). Many other countries around the globe, including the government of Nigeria also decided to dismiss all the educational institutions to contain the huge spread of the COVID-19 pandemic (Orfan & Elmyar, 2020).

The transformation process of face-to-face teaching began online teaching where thousands of teachers and students were allowed to employ this platform. Since then, the colleges of Education across the country have experienced online teaching as the new phenomenon during the COVID-19 pandemic where there was no prior preparation for such an emergency case.

During the last two decades in some parts of the world, online teaching has grown and changed dramatically due to various reasons (Bayrak, 2020). College and university lecturers are more interested in teaching and learning with online approaches where the learning process can be done more at a lower cost (Green, 2014). Green (2014) opined that online teaching can provide more opportunities of saving time and money since no one drive to seek knowledge. Despite this growing interest in online teaching, students’ satisfaction level remains the most concentrated indicator of online teaching experience. Students’ satisfaction level can be linked to a variety of factors, including students–teachers interaction, students–students interaction, course assessment quality, internet quality, self-efficacy, and students’ learning process (Kirtman, 2016). Therefore, online teaching played a vital role during this critical situation of the pandemic and gained a double reputation.

COVID-19 is an infectious disease caused by the most recently discovered coronavirus (SARS-COV-2). This new virus and disease were unknown before the outbreak began in Wuhan, China, in December 2019 (Olaniyi, 2021).

Coronaviruses (COVID) are a large family of viruses that cause illness ranging from the common cold to more severe diseases such as Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS-COV) and Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS-COV). The new coronavirus is spread from one person to another primarily through aerosol generated when an infected person coughs or sneezes. According to recent reports, it may be possible that people infected with the novel coronavirus spread the virus before showing significant symptoms.

Some patients with confirmed infections with the novel coronavirus have showed little to no symptoms while others have become severely ill and died. Symptoms of infection include: Fever, cough and shortness of breath. At this time, it is believed that symptoms may appear in as few as 2 days or as long as 14 days after exposure (Robert, 2021).

Scientists are working hard to understand this new virus and produce a vaccine. Antibiotics do not work against viruses; they only work on bacterial infections. Therefore, antibiotics should not be used as a means of prevention.

Statement of the Problem

It is no longer news that the Corona Virus pandemic 2019 known as COVID-19 affected basically all sectors of Nigerian economy, educational sector inclusive. As the matter of fact, schools were still closed even after almost all other sectors were opened. This ugly situation, which was unprepared for kept the students at home for many months.

During the period, many schools took advantage of online teaching (E-learning) with the aid of some gadgets to deliver learning contents to the students. This means that the students had to learn from their homes. Many schools could not make provision for audio-visual -E-learning which could have given the students see and hear their teachers teach which could have served as a motivation. Rather, they resulted to using majorly WhatsApp platform to deliver audio or visual learning contents to the students.

There has been reported poor academic performance by secondary school students in many subject, Biology in particular. Students’ academic achievement was poor compared to their performance before COVID-19 induced lockdown. Many attributed the poor academic performance exhibited by students in Biology to the fact that many could not participate in E-learning all though lockdown, students lost interest in learning, their reading habit is affected and more.

It is against this backdrop that this study is carried out to ascertain the effect of COVID-19 induced schools lockdown on teaching and learning Biology in Colleges of Education in Delta State.

Purpose of the Study

The main purpose of this study is to ascertain the effect of COVID-19 induced schools’ lockdown on teaching and learning biology in Colleges of Education in Delta State. Specifically, the study seeks to ascertain:

1. The effect of COVID-19 induced schools lockdown on the attitude of lecturers’ towards the use of e-learning in teaching Biology in Colleges of Education in Delta State.
2. The effect of COVID-19 induced schools lockdown on students’ reading habit in Biology in Colleges of Education in Delta State.

• The effect of COVID-19 induced schools’ lockdown on students’ academic achievement in Biology in Colleges of Education in Delta State.

Research Questions

To effectively carry out this study, the following research questions were raised:

1. What is the effect of the effect of COVID-19 induced schools lockdown on the attitude of lecturers’ towards the use of e-learning in teaching Biology in Colleges of Education in Delta State?
2. What is the effect of COVID-19 induced schools lockdown on students’ reading habit in Biology in Colleges of Education in Delta State?

• What is the effect of COVID-19 induced schools lockdown on students’ academic achievement in Biology in Colleges of Education in Delta State?

Significance of the Study

The study of this nature could be useful to students, teachers, government, filed of Biology Education and Researchers as a whole.

The study could go a long way in helping the students understand how COVID-19 schools induced lockdown affected their reading habit, rate of class participation and overall interest towards learning Biology so that they can work on their attitude towards the subject/course.

Teachers could also find this study useful because it could help them to understand how COVID-19 schools induced lockdown affected their attitude towards teaching biology and the ways to improve for better academic performance.

It could also be of benefit to the government in the sense that it could all their attention to the negative effect of COVID-19 schools induced lockdown on the overall teaching and learning Biology in Colleges of Education in the State which could enable them to apply the suggested strategies so as to enhance the teaching and learning of Biology at the said level of Education.

Finally, study could equally add to the literature in the field of Biology Education which could serve as a reference material to researcher who could carry out a similar study.

Scope/Delimitation of the Study

This study is delimited to the effect of COVID-19 induced schools lockdown on teaching and learning biology in Federal College of Education (Technical) in Delta State, with particular emphasis on lecturers’ attitude towards the use of instructional materials, students’ reading habit and academic performance in Biology.

Pages:  70

Category: Project

Format:  Word & PDF               

Chapters: 1-5                                          

Source: Imsuinfo

Material contains Table of Content, Abstract and References.