IMPACT OF TEACHER-PUPIL PROJECT COLLABORATION AND HANDS-ON ACTIVITIES ON BASIC SCIENCEPROCESS SKILLS

Abstract

Holistic development of the child requires the acquisition of 21 century skills and the need to equip children with the skills for sustainable development in a rapidly changing world, necessitates a paradigm shift in science education. This study therefore investigated the impact of Teacher-pupil Project Collaboration and Handson Activities on Basic Science process skills in primary school. Jean Piaget's  Cognitive Development and Lev Vygotsky's Sociocultural theories served as the  framework, while the pretest-posttest control group quasi-experimental design with
a 3x2 factorial matrix was adopted. Primary five pupils from three private and three public schools were randomly selected from Ibadan metropolis. Three stimulus instruments: Teacher-Pupil Project collaboration (TPPC), Hands-on Activities (HoA) and Conventional Strategies (CS) guides were used while one response instrument: Basic Science Process Skills Rating Scale (BSPSRS) was used for data collection. Inferential statistics of analysis of variance were used to test three null hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The results shows among others that there was a significant main effect of treatment on pupils' science process skills (F = (2;148)
2 5.38; p<0.05; partial ῆ = 0.07) where pupils exposed to Teacher-pupils project collaboration had the highest Basic science process skills mean score (.034). Teacher pupil project collaboration, more than hands-on activities instructional strategies, enhanced pupils' basic science process skills in the Ibadan metropolis. Therefore, basic science teachers should adopt Teacher pupil project collaboration to promote the acquisition of basic science process skills at the primary school.