ABSTRACT

In spite of the fact that most teachers of the English language have been trained in the use of instructional media, learning the English language is a challenge as seen in performance indicators in Bungoma North district. The purpose of this study was to investigate and describe secondary school English language teachers’ use of instructional media for purposes of enhancing the teaching and learning of their students and the extent to which these media are used. The objectives of the study were to identify the instructional media available for teaching English in the secondary schools in Bungoma North District, identify the different types of instructional media available in secondary schools in Bungoma North district, find out the frequency to which instructional media are used in teaching English in secondary schools in Bungoma North district and find out the contribution that instructional media has on learning of the English language. It was based on John Sweller’s Cognitive Load Theory (2005).This study employed the exploratory survey design because it surveyed the schools and described the situation of the use of instructional media in the secondary schools: The target population was 36 secondary schools in Bungoma North district. 30 schools were randomly sampled for teacher and library personnel respondents and 10 for student respondents for the study. A pilot study was first carried out on a representative sample of one of the schools prior to actual data collection. The purpose was to pre-test the research instruments for reliability and validity as well as establish the feasibility of the study. It involved the use of questionnaires as the research instruments. Stratified random sampling was used for the two classes and finally simple random sampling for the student respondents. The sample size was 406 respondents comprising 346 students, 30 teachers of English and 30 library personnel. Questionnaires were used to elicit information from students, teachers and library personnel on the availability and use of instructional media. Only one library personnel for each school was involved. Data analysis was done using the Excel computer program as a tool in order to produce data which was presented in frequencies, means and percentages.