EFFECTS OF COLLABORATIVE CONSTRUCTIVISM ON ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE OF BIOLOGY STUDENTS OF DIFFERENT COGNITIVE STYLES IN COLLEGES OF EDUCATION NORTH-EAST ZONE, NIGERIA.

Abstract
This study investigates the impact of collaborative constructivism on academic achievement of biology students of different cognitive styles in colleges of education comparatively. The population of study consisted of five thousand two hundred and three (5,203) students drawn from ten Colleges of Education in the North-East Geo-political Zone of Nigeria. subjects were randomly assigned to experimental and control groups using table of random numbers. Cognitive styles inventory by Paragon (2011) was used to classify subjects to field dependent and field independent cognitive styles. The experimental group was treated with six weeks of teaching using collaborative constructivism approach. The control group were exposed to six weeks of teaching the same topic using lecture method. A pretest was conducted for the two groups. After treatment, a posttest was administered to both groups using Biology Achievement Test (BAT) Research questions included; what is the effect of collaborative constructivism on the academic performances of field dependent and field independent biology students taught desertification using constructivism and lecture methods. Research hypotheses include; there is no significant difference in the academic achievement of field dependent and field independent biology students taught using different methods. A One- way Analysis of Variance at P. value of 0.05 revealed that the field independent members of the experimental group performed excellently. The field dependent members also performed better than the control group. Recommendations include (i) organization of workshop and conferences where teachers could be exposed to collaborative constructivism approach for science teaching (ii) Also emphasis on the use of collaborative constructivism by teachers to take care of individual differences is advocated, among others.
Description
A THESIS SUBMITTED TO THE SCHOOL OF POSTGRADUATE STUDIES IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT FOR THE AWARD OF MASTERS DEGREE IN SCIENCE EDUCATION.
Keywords
COLLABORATIVE, CONSTRUCTIVISM, ACADEMIC, BIOLOGY, COGNITIVE STYLES, COLLEGES OF EDUCATION, NORTH-EAST, NORTH-EAST
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