Chapter one
Introduction
1.1 Background to the study
The family is a social unit in any society and it is the source of early stimulation and experience in children. The home influences the child at the most possible time of his life at a time when his mind is most receptive. It provides the first impression which may last through the whole of the child’s life. The child often sees the parents, siblings and things in their immediate environment to be most significant and they are capable of promoting or diminishing him in self worth and academic performance. The background is the condition and immediate surroundings in which the pupils find themselves. It is also refer to as the physical and psychological conditions that affect children (Durojaiye, 1976). The parents or guidance of these pupils are responsible for providing the right home environment that will facilitate effective learning for their wards. Furthermore, in pupil’s home background, some factors that influence their academic performance include: parental educational background, parental economic status (At least an average financial status), parental marital status and parental home location.
Parent’s educational background, could be seen in the way parents and other educated people in the home get involve in encouraging these pupils to learn, teach and guide the pupils in doing their home work, pronounce words correctly and practice how to make correct sentences. The educational background of the parents will also be expressed in their frequent use of English Language as a medium of communication in the home (John 1994). These will help in laying a good foundation for self expression, confidence in speaking good English in the public and good understanding of Basic English concepts in the school. On the aspect of parental economic status as it relates to pupils academic performance, much emphasis was laid on the ability of the parents to provide necessary facilities or materials that can help in making the learning of English Language easy for the pupils. This involves the provision of mini library for children which include; textbooks, story books, and picture books and spelling charts which will help the pupils to learn words identification, correct spellings, correct sentences, master the use of correct tenses in line with pictures, (United State Department of Labor, 2006).
Pupils from average/high income home background, that have some educative media in their homes such as Computer, television set, radio, tape recorder will be at an advantage in their performance because these media will help them to listen to good speeches in English Language, watch educative programmes on television such as junior debate, Cartoons, tales by moonlight, all these exposures will certainly reflect on the pupils academic performance at school. In assessing the parental marital status on pupils academic performance, much attention is on sound human relations, as the home bckground that is tensed due to divorce or unhealthy atmosphere of quarrelling, fighting due to polygamy cannot favour learning, in the home as the mind of the pupils will not be settled in order to give room for creativity. Ekanem (2004) stated that harmonious home create emotional stability in the child at home and subsequently throughout his school life.
Hence the researcher will also be of concerned with the careful study of the influence of single parenthood due to broken home, death, widowhood and intact home on the academic performance of pupils in English Language. In terms of the influence of home location on the academic performance of pupils, the concern of the researcher is with the socio-metric factors such as the kinds of social activities around the home environment of the pupils. For instance, a pupil that lives near the market square will adopt the language of the people around him which is pidgin. This could affect the child in learning good English at school. Likewise, a pupil that lives in a communal compound where pidgin is the order of the day would also be affected negatively in the learning of good English at school. Furthermore, pupils from homes located in an environment where there is noisy traffic, noisy sound of machine from ply-wood industry and market square will be affect negatively in their academic performance because the noisy environment will disturb them from concentrating while reading their novels, textbooks ,Story books and even in listening to educative radio programmes. Hence, Durojaiye (1976) maintained that physical and psychological conditions of the home environment affect the children academically.
