TEACHERS’ NON-DEMOGRAPHIC CHARACTERISTICS, STUDENTS’WORK ETHICS AND SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS’ LEARNING OUTCOME IN LAGOS STATE, NIGERIA: IMPLICATIONS FOR EDUCATIONAL POLICY

Abstract

This study examined how teachers’non-demographic characteristics and student-related factors such as students’ work ethics (hours of study, goal setting and group study) relate to students learning outcomes in the senior secondary schools in Lagos State, Nigeria. This study adopted the descriptive survey research design. The simple random sampling technique was used to select one Education District which has1,885 teachers and 28,234 students in 51 public senior secondary schools. The sample consisted 150 teachers and 300 students selected from 10 schools using the proportionate sampling technique. The total number of participants involved in the study was 450.Two sets of self-constructed questionnaires entitled: Teachers’Characteristics Questionnaire (TCQ) and Students’ Work Ethics Questionnaire (SWEQ) were used for data collection. A standardised test drawn from the Mathematics and English Examinations past question papers of the West African Examination Council (WAEC) was administered on the students to collect data on students’ learning outcome. Reliability coefficient of 0.81 was obtained for the TCQ and 0.74 for the SWEQ. The hypotheses were tested using the Pearson Product Moment Correlation at0.05significance level. The study revealed that there is significant relationship among teachers’ interactions, frequency of teachers’ feedback, hours of study and students’ learning outcomes. The study recommended among others that policy on teacher professional training should be regularly reviewed and enforced to update teachers with classroom management skills among others.