METHODS USED FOR TEACHING HISTORY IN SENIOR SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN ILORIN METROPOLIS

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

Background to the Study

History as a school subject is the study of change and development in society over time. The study of History enables us to understand how past human action affects the present and influences our future, and it allows us to evaluate these effects. So, History is about learning how to think about the past, which affects the present, in a disciplined way.

According to Fafunwa (1974), History to a people is what memory is to an individual. Also Abiri and Jekayinfa (2008) asserted that people with no knowledge of their past are a victim of collective amnesia, groping blindly into the future without guidepost of precedence to shape their course. History is a process of enquiry; therefore, it is about asking questions of the past. What happened? When did it happen? Why did it happen then? What were the short-term and long-term results? It involves thinking critically about the stories people tell us about the past, as well as the stories that we tell ourselves. History is a distinctive and well-established academic discipline with its own methods and discourses. Its field of study is potentially limitless, in that it encompasses the totality of past human experience. Among scholars who study History, there can be differences and even controversy between some who regard it as an account of an actual past, and others who view it as an entirely imagined or constructed past.

 History as a school subject is chosen as a medium to convey government’s intention because it is the only subject that teaches about the past which can be used to explain today’s and tomorrow’s events Lowenthal (2000), as well as use to instill the patriotic values among the younger generation. To materialize the government’s commitment, it is important to teach History in a way that encourage younger generation to really understand the History of their nation and to nourish their patriotic values.

The teaching of History as a secondary school subject introduces learners to the critical dimensions of the life of the society and further inducts them into educational, historical and cultural discourses underpinning the society, how it evolved and things that contributed to this evolution and offers preliminary understanding of the roles of all these discourses in how society is today as it relates to their current circumstances. History has been developed as a discipline. Few educators would deny the need to teach History in our secondary schools, junior colleges, and universities. However, it seems as though History sometimes takes a "back seat" to other social sciences, e.g economics and political science.

 History is a discovery project. It is a process that learners undergo that cognitively adds to them knowing what happened in the past with regards to their present lives. It helps shapes learners world views and also assists in making them take positions informed by their past. It helps learners to evaluate and re-evaluate how their past contributed to their present and how it might help shape their future. Through History it may be possible for learners to connect the dots of their current lives and how it came to be. Connecting these dots could help them understand how the past evolved and just how it shaped the present. All these connections could eventually have meaning to learners. History is informative in a way that is interesting and important especially if it is taught in unbiased way that presents all the facts as they happened.

However, for effective teaching and learning in schools, there are teaching methods adopted in the teaching and learning process. Teaching methods aids learning and help to communicate ideas and skills to the students. . Avent (2010) stated that method is a procedure by which a goal is reached, a purpose accomplished or a result achieved. Teaching methods is any teaching maneuver that can be used to facilitate students’ learning and satisfaction Dorgu (2011).

Methods of teaching denotes the strategy by which a teacher delivers his or her subject matter to the learners based on some predetermined instructional objectives in order to promote learning in the students. The effective implementation of any curriculum depends to a large extent on the availability of various methods of teaching. As explained by Buseri and Dorgu (2011), to teach is to impact knowledge, an attempt to help the learner to have a change of attitude through a series of planned activities. People over the years have opined that no educational system can rise above the quality of its teacher, nor can a nation rise above the quality of her educational system.

 Therefore, it is the duty of a teacher to ensure that appropriate teaching method or a combination of two or more methods is used in order to achieve the stated aims and objectives of a subject. Some of the various method of teaching  Includes; Lecture or the chalk and talk method,  Discussion method, Demonstration method , Discovery method,  Assignment/project method, Field trips method (Excursion), Individualized instructional method, simulation, Laboratory method, Inductive and deductive method, Open education method, Values Clarifications, Computer Assisted Instructions (CAI) e.t.c These are various methods, approaches and techniques use for teaching. The role of teacher is to select his own method of teaching according to his subject and students. 

From the aforementioned, this section will briefly mention some of the methods which are mostly adopted by History teachers in the teaching of history, they include the following; narration method, discussion method, project method, dramatization method, and demonstration method e.t.c From the foregoing, it is important for teachers of history to know the appropriate method to use in teaching of this subject (History). The knowledge of the appropriate method used in teaching various discipline will aid better understanding and learning situation. Hence, this study is set out to look into the methods used in teaching History in senior secondary schools.

Statement of the Problem

Despite the various efforts put in place by government, school administrators and curriculum developers in the teaching of History in secondary school, it is still surprising to know that most teachers find it difficult in adopting the appropriate teaching methods in teaching of History. The result of this is students dropping the course and concluding that history is a boring subject The effect of this inappropriate teaching methods is student’s inability to understand the content of the lesson that is been taught. The use of wrong teaching methods makes the students to easily forget what they have been taught in school. Without the use of appropriate instructional method, learning becomes boring to the students and they can easily lost interest. A number of studies have been conducted on methods of teaching history. Talin (2014) carried out a study on “The Teaching of History in Secondary Schools”, Mwathwana, Mungai, Gathumbi and George (2014) also carried out a research titled “An Analysis of Teaching History in High schools”, Wiersma (2010) carried out a study that aimed at investigating current practices in secondary history education. However all these research activities was complete departure from the present study. Therefore, this is the gap this study tends to fulfill by examining the methods used for teaching History in senior secondary schools.

However, History teachers can make History exciting by discussing current, relevant problems and seeing where such problems "lead back and forth across the centuries" Evans (1989) by doing this history teachers can become what Cannon calls the best of all "general educators". From the foregoing, it is seen that appropriate History teaching methods in secondary schools have posed a great challenge for both the teacher as well as the students. It is on this note that the researcher examines the methods used in teaching of History in secondary schools.

Purpose of the Study

The general purpose of this study is to examine the various teaching methods used by history teachers in secondary schools in Ilorin metropolis. Specifically, this study intends to examine:

1.      The teaching methods used by history teachers in teaching history in Ilorin metropolis

2.      If difference exist in the methods used for teaching history based on teachers’ gender

3.      If difference exist in the methods used for teaching history based on teachers’ educational qualification

4.      If difference exist in the methods used for teaching history based on teachers’ teaching experience

Research questions

The following research questions would be answered in the course of this study:

1.      What are the methods used for teaching history in secondary in Ilorin metropolis?

2.      Is there any difference in the methods used for teaching history based on teachers’ gender?

3.      Is there any difference in the methods used for teaching history based on teachers’ educational qualification?

4.       Is there any difference in the methods used for teaching history based on teachers’ experience?

Research Hypotheses

Ho1: there is no significant difference in the methods used for teaching history based on teachers’ gender

Ho2: there is no significant difference in the methods used for teaching history based on teachers’ educational qualification

Ho3: there is no significant difference in the methods used for teaching history based on teachers’ experience

Scope of the Study

The study is set out to examine the methods used for teaching history in secondary schools in Ilorin metropolis. The population of this study would be all history teachers in Ilorin metropolis. One hundred (100) history teachers would be sampled for this study using simple random sampling technique. A researcher’s designed questionnaire would be used for data collection while the data collected would be analyzed using descriptive statistics (percentage, mean and standard deviation) and inferential statistics (T-test and analysis of variance ANOVA) at 0.05 level of significance.

Operational Definition of Terms

The following terms and variables would be defined as used in this study:

Teaching: the term teaching as used in this research work is defined as the process of impacting knowledge to others.

Teaching Methods: the term teaching method as used in this study refers to the general principles pedagogy and management strategies used for classroom instruction

History: history as used in this research is an account of what has happened in the past which may or may not have influence in the present and future.

Significance of the study

The result of this research work would be of great importance in finding possible ways to improve the teaching of history in secondary schools.

However, this study would be of benefit to history teachers by enlightening them on the need to make use of appropriate methods in teaching of history. The findings of this research work would also encourage history teachers to adopt the appropriate history teaching methods which will in turn arouse the learner’s interest in this field (history) and by extension aid easier teaching and better understanding of history.

The result of this research would also be of importance to students in that it would develop students’ interest in learning of past activities and how it has helped in shaping the present and the future and how it affects them directly or indirectly. The findings of this study would allow students to know the importance of learning history and also appreciate history as part of the school curriculum. The findings of the research study would be use to enlighten the school management of the need to provide in-service training and learning process for teachers of history as a subject and also curriculum developers.

The result of this research would be useful in prompting the government to organize seminars and workshops to teach teachers on the use of appropriate teaching methods.

The study might motivate further research investigating the same concept in different settings and therefore leading us to compare the results.

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