MATHEMATICS TEACHERS’ PERCEPTION OF THEIR COMPETENCIES IN TEACHING SECONDARY SCHOOL MATHEMATICS AND FURTHER MATHEMATICS
ABSTRACT
The study was undertaken to determine mathematics and further mathematics teachers’ perception of their competence in teaching mathematics and further mathematics in senior secondary schools in federal capital territory Abuja Nigeria. The study was motivated by the poor achievement of student in mathematics and further mathematics. The study therefore sought to find out the perception of the competencies of teachers in teaching the contents drawn from the curriculum, planning and implementation of instruction, classroom management. The study further sought to find out the perception of teachers in the use of educational technology and other teaching aids, evaluation of instructions, influence of teacher qualification and gender on their competence in teaching. Fourteen research questions and four null hypotheses guided the study. The study adopted the survey research design. The population is made up of 260 mathematics teachers and 16 further mathematics teachers of the fifty six (56) FCT owned senior secondary schools in the six area councils while the sample consisted of 181 mathematics teachers and 11 further mathematics teachers composed through simple random sampling techniques. The competence rating scale for mathematics teachers, (CRSM), the competence rating scale for further mathematics teacher (CRSFM) and observational check list was used for data collection. Data collected were analyzed using mean scores, standard deviation, percentage count of observed check list and t- test at 5% level of significance. The result of the analysis revealed that mathematics teachers perceived their competence in teaching the topics drawn from the mathematics curriculum as very low, very low competence in planning and implementation of instruction, low competence in classroom management, very low competence in the use of educational technology and other teaching aids and very low competence in evaluation of instruction in mathematics. There is significant difference in the mean score of more and less qualified teachers on their perception of their competence in teaching mathematics while there is no significant difference in the mean score of male and female teachers on their competence in teaching mathematics On the other hand further mathematics teachers had very low competence in teaching the topics drawn from further mathematics curriculum, planning and implementation of instruction, classroom management, use of educational technology and other teaching aids and evaluation of students achievement in further mathematics. There is no significant difference in the mean score of male and female further mathematics teachers on their competence in teaching. Based on these findings the researcher recommend that More conferences, seminars and workshops should be organized by the ministry and boards for teachers who teach mathematics and further mathematics in area of classroom management, evaluation of instruction, use of instructional materials and pedagogies as this will equip them with more skills to believe in themselves that they can implement mathematics and further mathematics curriculum perfectly. Internet facilities and well equipped libraries should be provided for every school for private research by teachers. This will expose them to up-to-date knowledge in content, planning of instruction, use of modern education technology, instructional tools and better ways of evaluating learning outcomes.