Browsing by Author "Amponsah, K.D."
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Item Examining Teachers’ Perceptions Of The Impact Of Government Of Ghana’s Wi-Fi Technology Program On Teaching Practices: An Empirical Study From The Senior High Schools In The Cape Coast Metropolis(Cogent Education, 2024) Asomah, R.K.; Amponsah, K.D.; Agyei, D.D.; et al.The study discusses the impact of a nationwide deployment of Wi-Fi technology in some Senior High Technical Vocational Schools (SHTVs) in Ghana, using the first four levels of Guskey’s framework. A stratified sampling approach was used to select 119 teachers as participants in the study. An embedded mixed-methods research design was employed to collect data using a questionnaire with both closed-ended and open-ended items. The findings revealed that the deployment of Wi-Fi technology impacted positively on the teachers’ learning experiences and was positively perceived by the teachers in facilitating teaching and learning practices. However, the study also revealed some deficits in reliability, trust, and connectivity associated with the Wi-Fi technology, highlighting the need to explore factors that maximize the output of technological initiatives. The study identifies the school’s organization and the teachers’ learning experiences as two key predictors of maximizing the use of Wi-Fi technology in educational establishments. The study recommends equipping teachers with the requisite competencies in the use of Wi-Fi technologies through professional development programs, training, and the enactment of ICT curriculum-based policies in schools. These policies and support will promote and enhance the effectiveness of of Wi-Fi technology among teachers, enabling them to shift from traditional to more technologically inclined, student-centred learning.Item Game-based learning in Ghanaian primary schools: listening to the views of teachers(International Journal of Primary, Elementary and Early Years Education, 2023) Yeboah, R.; Amponsah, K.D.; Mintah, P.C.; Sedofia, J.; Donkor, P.B.K.This research explores how primary school teachers use games to enhance pupils’ learning and development of conceptual knowledge. The study employs an illustrative case study design; data was collected through interviews with thirty (30) teachers who were selected using purposive sampling technique. Twenty teachers had some knowledge of game-based learning, ten teachers, however, did not know anything about the concept game-based learning. The results show that the use of non-digital games of different kinds to engage pupils is common in the learning of Maths, English, and Science. Teachers ascribed positively that the integration of game-based learning motivates pupils to come to school, actively engages them in the learning process, helps pupils to easily assimilate lesson contents, makes lessons lively and fun, and builds collaborative skills amongst pupils. Inadequate resources, noisy classes, time constraints, large class sizes, the reluctance of some pupils to participate, and inadequate knowledge are challenges reported by the teachers.Item Impact of Collaboration on Male and Female Students’ Comprehension of Electrochemistry(University of Ghana, 2019-03-27) Amponsah, K.D.This study reports on research findings on the effect of collaboration on male and female learners’ comprehension of electrochemistry concepts in the Ximhungwe circuit of the Bohlabela district in the Mpumalanga province of South Africa. The theoretical frame work of this study is rooted in Posner et al’s Accommodation of a Scientific Conception: Toward a Theory of Conceptual Change. This theory strongly proves that learning is a social process and communication facilitates learning. Conceptual change is interpreted as what actual knowledge the group collectively produces and agrees upon. An intact sample of 47 12th grade physical sciences learners from two public schools in the circuit participated in the study. One of the schools was a high achieving school (HAS) and the other a low achieving school (LAS) as was classified by the Department of Education, Mpumalanga Province, South Africa. Learners were given electrochemistry concept test (ECT) and Chemistry Classroom Environment Questionnaire (CCEQ) as pre-test and post-test. After the treatment using a self-designed conceptual change teaching strategy of collaboration, ANCOVA conducted on post-test scores of the learners showed that there was no significant mean difference between male and female learners in their comprehension of electrochemistry concepts. Similarly, there was no significant interaction effect between gender and treatment. However, Pearson Product-Moment Correlation revealed that there was moderately positive relationship between achievement and learners’ perception of their chemistry classroom environment. The findings suggest that collaboration was equally effective for both males and females.Item Relevance of the Senior High School Curriculum in Relation to Contextual Reality of the World of Work(2019-02-20) Okrah, A.K.; Amponsah, K.D.Issues relating to relevance of a curriculum have been of interest to educationists due to public yelps without resorting to empirical evidence. The senior high school is a terminating point for most of the graduating students making most of them unemployed. This mass unemployment of the youth after senior high school has mostly been attributed to the irrelevance of the curriculum. However, the skills in the curriculum have not been subjected to critical analysis to empirically prove their relevance or otherwise. The purpose of the study was therefore to identify the skills embedded in the curriculum, those skills the learners have acquired and those that employers usually demand of employees by relating them to empirical findings of the skills employers in general demand of employees. A conceptual analysis through content analysis approach was used to quantitatively determine the skills embedded in the curriculum. A qualitative analysis was then used to examine the richness of the skills. This ultimately led to purposive sampling procedure in which twenty-one students and fourteen key informants were selected for an interview. The data from the interview were sorted out into themes and coded through the use of NVivo 8 to help in the counting of frequencies of each skill. It was found out that the senior high school curriculum, though was generally rated as relevant, the skills with the highest frequencies in the curriculum focused on attitudes and values while those required by employers focused on the application of knowledge. The skills with the highest frequencies were those of the affective domain but the highest percentage values suggested in the curriculum constituted those of the cognitive domain. On the basis of these findings, it can be concluded that the curriculum is relevant in instilling values into the students but it is not relevant in the application of knowledge that employers usually demand of employees at the work environment. It is, therefore, recommended that the curriculum be reviewed, if similar findings of this type of research in different contexts are found, to get rid of those mismatches, in order to make it more relevant to the needs of contemporary society.Item Stressors and Coping Strategies: The case of Teacher Education Students at University of Ghana(University of Ghana, 2020-02-26) Amponsah, K.D.; Ampadu, E.This research examined the stressors that teacher education students of the University of Ghana usually encounter and the coping stratagems that they frequently embrace. Random sampling technique was employed to select 270 second- and third-year undergraduate students in 2018/2019 academic year to answer a survey questionnaire with closed-ended and open-ended questions. Dental Environmental Stress (DES) questionnaire on stressors was adapted whereas coping stratagems that might be utilised by students to minimise stress was measured using an adapted form of the Brief COPE. The outcomes of the research revealed that ‘working to meet scholastic requirements’, ‘inadequate supply of power and water in halls’, and ‘changes in eating and sleeping habits’, were three major stressors experienced by teacher education students. Furthermore, learners utilised numerous approaches, such as praying or meditating, and self-diverting actions as coping strategies. Learners also used more adaptive coping strategies, than maladaptive and avoidance coping strategies. Overall, resident students were found to be more stressed than non-resident students. Again, this study revealed that resident students are more prayerful and easily get help and advice from lecturers or teaching assistants but deeply averse with substance abuse such as using tobacco/ alcohol/ drug to feel better compared with their non-resident counterparts. It was recommended that the Department of Teacher Education should establish a counselling centre to assign academic counsellors to learners and organise frequent stress management programmes for them.Item Teachers’ and Educational Administrators’ Conceptions of Inquiry: Do They Promote or Constrain Inquiry-Based Science Teaching in Junior High Schools?(Journal of Curriculum and Teaching, 2021) Mohammed, S.M.; Amponsah, K.D.This study sought to examine whether teachers’ and educational administrators’ conceptions of inquiry promote or constrain inquiry-based science teaching in junior high schools. The study also explored any connections between participants’ conceptions of scientific inquiry, inquiry teaching, and inquiry learning. Multiple-case study involving semi-structured interviews was used to collect data from 18 integrated science teachers and 23 educational administrators from rural and urban areas in the Central Region of Ghana. Analysis of the qualitative data involved open coding and categorisation of participants’ responses. We found that all the teachers and educational administrators held either uninformed or partially informed conceptions of scientific inquiry and inquiry teaching and learning which, constrain inquiry-based science instruction in junior high schools. We also found that participants’ conceptions of scientific inquiry reflected in their conceptions of science teaching and learning. Again, we found that the uninformed conceptions of inquiry developed from participants’ lack of exposure and experiences with inquiry-based science instruction when they were students. We recommend regular explicit-reflective in-service trainings to promote teachers’ and educational administrators’ conceptions and teachers’ practice of inquiry-based science teaching. We also recommend reforms in preservice science education that emphasise the engagement of prospective teachers in collaborative explicit-reflective inquiry investigations and instructional practices.