CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.0 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
Instructional materials applies to any physical materials to which one turns for aid in time of need for imparting knowledge and skills. These embraces persons, real object, printed, pictures and other related equipment which are designed, structured and selected with the learning needs of particular students and particular course in mind.
The educational system may not be effectively run without instructional materials. It is a common assertion that progress of a country depends very much on how it applies available scientific knowledge for practical purposes. So, it becomes imperative that young children be given training in science to enable them to understand and appreciate the many valued applications of science. In this research entitled “The effect of unavailability of instructional materials on the teaching and leaning of Biology” instructional materials here refers to resources which the teacher provides in the class to motivate learning. Teaching most of the topics in Biology without the use of instructional materials will be a waste of time on the part of the student and wasteful effort on the part of the information/lesson, verbally. The benefit derived from the teaching and learning of Biology in schools depends largely on proper use of accurate and appropriate instructional materials. MATERIALS RESOURCES: These consist of non-human resources that can be used to enhance learning. Baja (1987), In Udofot (1995) sees material resources as including equipment and reference books. Biology owing to its unified form and activity- Oriented base depends heavily on the material resources of the immediate locality of the learners to succeed especially in the face of dwindling funding by government.According to Dike (1967), in the Udofot (1995), resource materials do not only help create correct impression through the eyes and the ears, but they also provides stimulus for student to find out things for themselves and to assimilate them according to their interpretation. Resource materials for teaching Biology include the following;
i Biology classroom or laboratory.
ii laboratory furniture.
iii Service point.
iv Teacher’s demonstration tables.
v Glass wares (or plastic wares).
vi Fire fighting equipment.
vii Locally available improvised pieces of apparatus.
It is worthy to stress on (i), (ii) and (vii) above because they are most often neglected regardless of their importance. Classroom or laboratories for teaching Biology should be large and spacious enough to allow for free movement by students. This is because there is need for students to leave their seats to collect pieces of equipments from the teacher’s demonstration table or more from one station to manipulate available apparatus. The need will also arise frequently for the teacher’s of Biology to move about from one student’s work group to the other for purposes of interacting an d assessing the student’s activities. Desks, benches or preferably tables will provide a comfortable seating arrangement for students of Biology. These materials should be moveable as it may become necessary that desks or tables be put together into groups to form a work group station. As group work dominates most of the Biology teaching strategy, it is important to provides workstations that will conveniently accommodate the desired group size bajar,(1983) in Udofot (1995).Teaching is indeed a complex process and secondary schools teachings seems to be even more complex because at this level we are dealing with adolescent who need more attention. Teachers who teach in secondary schools therefore must be made to understand that they have a very important role to play in preparing the young stars for the greater tasks ahead. If the teacher fails to give a good start at this age, this child’s future could be gloomy. A number of factors could be responsible for the apparent decline in the standard of teaching Biology. But one that easily comes to mind is the quality of instructions. According to bloom (1983) in Akpe (1993) “every normal child can learn practically everything if given the right quality of instruction at appropriate time” A very important variable, which has direct bearing on the quality of classroom instructional materials adopted in the teaching of the subject by the teacher. However it is not the sheer unavailability of instructional materials perse that affect the quality of the instruction. Equally important is their variety and utilization. The primary purpose of using instructional materials in teaching and effective and to facilitate learning .it does not do the whole job because it cannot entirely replace the human teacher in the classroom.
These teaching materials are administered and controlled by the teacher. If it is well selected and used accordingly, it works Resource utilization increases the rate of learning and at the same time provides teachers with some spare time for other activities that contribute to the enhancement of the teaching learning process.
