Factors influencing students' choice of geography in public secondary schools in Murang'a South Sub-County
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Date
2014-10-09
Authors
Wachira, Isaac Kiiru
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Kenyatta University
Abstract
The Kenyan secondary school curriculum gives students freedom to make their selections
from a range of subjects. Some of the subjects are compulsory for the students but,
students are also given freedom to select from a number of elective subjects. In selecting
the elective subjects, students usually have various reasons for doing so and other factors
also influence their choices in selecting some subjects as their alternatives and in this case
geography. This study therefore sought to explore factors influencing the choice of
geography as an option subject. The study was guided by the following objectives: to
identify the institutional reasons that influence the selection of geography subject by
learners; to determine the influence of geography curriculum on the choice of the subject;
to find out the influence of students' career aspirations on the choice of geography; and to
determine the relationship between gender and choice of geography subject. The study
was based on Social Cognitive Career Theory by Lent, Brown, & Hackett, (2002) and
Lent, (2005). The study employed descriptive survey design to target 76 geography
teachers, 30 HODs humanities and 2,253 students from 38 secondary schools. The
researcher used stratified sampling method to select 12 schools to participate in the study.
The 12 schools represented 31.6% of the target population. From each of the 12 sampled
schools, simple random sampling was used to select 192 students while purposive
sampling was used to select 24 geography teachers and 12 Heads of Departmentshumanities,
giving a total of 228 respondents. A questionnaire for teachers and another
one designed for students, and an interview schedule for HODs humanities were used for
data collection. Prior to the actual analysis, the researcher conducted a pilot study in 3
schools which were not included in the final sample. The purpose of the pilot study was
to enable the researcher to improve reliability of the instruments and familiarize himself
with the data collection process. Data for the study were both qualitative and quantitative.
Quantitative data were analyzed using descriptive statistics such as frequency counts,
percentages, means, and standard deviations. Qualitative analysis considered the
inferences that were made from the opinions of the informants. This analysis was
thematically presented in narrative form and where possible tabular form. The results of
the analysis were then presented by use of frequency tables, pie charts and bar graphs.
The study established that the major institutional factors influencing students during
selection of geography subject were; teachers' attributes, adequacy of geography
resources and school past performance in geography. The results indicated that most of
the students like teaching methodologies employed by Geography teachers and the use of
teaching aids. However, majority of them stated that lack of adequate geography
resources and school's past performance in the subject negatively influenced them during
subject selection. More so, majority of the students reported that some topics were too
abstract to understand and also the syllabus is too wide to cover. In terms of career
aspiration, the study revealed that majority of students taking Geography aspired to be
surveyors, meteorologists, pilots and tour guides in future. This means that career
aspiration had a great impact towards choice of the subject. In relation to gender, the
study found out that both male and female students did not differ significantly in their
perception towards geography curriculum. The study recommended that; Geography
should be allocated more time in school time table to ensure coverage of the syllabus;
schools should ensure that more funds are allocated to the department of humanities to
cater for adequate teaching and learning resources and field trips for geography students
Description
A Research Project Submitted to the School of Education in Partial Fulfilment of the Requirement for the Award of the Degree of Master of Education, Kenyatta University, July, 2015. G 78 .K4W3