Concept-Mapping: An Innovative Pedagogy to Enhance Academic Performance in Science among Primary School Children in Zaria, Nigeria

Abstract

This quasi-experimental study investigated the instructional impact of Concept-Identifying concept-mapping strategy as an innovative pedagogy to enhance academic performance in basic science among primary school children in Zaria, Nigeria. A sample of 363 pupils (188 Control group & 175 Experimental group) in intact classes from four public primary schools (2 experimental & 2 control) was randomly drawn from the population of 14,749 pupils. Human Circulatory System topic was selected for the study. The experimental groups were taught using Concept Identifying concept-mapping strategy while the control groups were taught with didactic lecture methods respectively for a period of six weeks. The instruments used for data collection were Basic Science Performance Test and Concept-mapping Test. Instruments were validated by experts. BSPT had reliability coefficient of 0.82 while Inter-Rater Reliability for scoring the Concept Identifying concept-mapping test was 0.80. Two research questions raised were answered using means and standard deviations while the null hypotheses were tested at P?0.05 using t-test statistics. Results showed that the Concept-Identifying Concept-mapping strategy had significant impact on the performance mean scores of pupils than didactic lecture method (P ? 0.05). Also, there was no significant difference between mean rubric scores of male and female pupils in this study (P ? 0.05). Based on these findings, it was recommended that Concept Identifying Learning Strategy may be a useful scaffold in teaching primary pupils how to create their own concept maps and consequently enhance learning.