IMPACT OF TEACHERS WORK INCENTIVES AND INSTRUCTIONAL MATERIALS ON ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE OF BUSINESS EDUCATION STUDENTS IN YABA COLLEGE OF TECHNOLOGY

IMPACT OF TEACHERS WORK INCENTIVES AND INSTRUCTIONAL MATERIALS ON ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE OF BUSINESS EDUCATION STUDENTS IN YABA COLLEGE OF TECHNOLOGY  

                                                                CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.0    Background of the study

Education has been recognized as the fundamental basis on which any nation could function effectively. It’s socio-political and economic viability depend solely on the qualitative education given to her citizens. Any nation that want to be recognized as a develop country must build its human resources firmly. Hence, a country is said to be technological developed if majority of her populace are well educated. Therefore, those that impart the needed knowledge or those that build and mould character must be motivated adequately because motivation is the key to performance and improvement. Hence, it is believed that motivated teacher always complete the task set for him, even when such tasks or assignment are difficult or seems uninteresting.

In order to get maximum efficiency and productivity out of teachers, many factors such as job security, working conditions, salary levels and working hours must be considered because these are some of the factors that contribute to the morale and motivation of teachers. In schools the motivation and job satisfaction of teachers is important because it impacts directly on the delivery of lessons, the effectiveness of teaching student performance (Perumal 2011).

According to Truman and Raggl (2008),  ifteachers are committed and satisfied, the attitudes mentioned above get translated into higher levels of teacher’s performance in the classroom. Thus, if teachers are contented with their jobs they will be more productive and will develop and maintain high levels of performance leading to more efficiency and effectiveness in the teaching-learning process (Usop& Johnson 2013).

There are many different reasons why we do things. Sometimes we are motivated to act because of internal desires and wishes but at other times our behaviours are driven by a desire for external rewards. The incentives theory is one of the major theories of motivation and suggests that behaviour is motivated by a desire for incentives.

The teaching-learning process is a two way activity that requires active participation from all concerned. In light of these, the teacher must devise means to bring about the active participation of the students which can be aroused by use of instructional materials (audio, visual and audio-visual) assignments, field trips, etc.

Instructional materials facilitate, stimulate and aid students to take active interest in any topic introduced by the teacher. It provides both the teacher and the students with relevant and meaningful source of information. It stimulates the students desire to learn and also assist in the learning process by making memorization and assimilation easy.Seeing, touching and listening which are characteristics of instructional materials are gateway of human learning in this 21st century. Aramide and Bolarinwa (2010) opine that instructional materials have the potential for enhancing students learning. Its role in teaching and learning process is one of the most important widely discussed issues in contemporary education policy. Education in this age is has become wide spread and as such, exclusive oral teaching cannot be key to successful pedagogy.

1.1    Statement of the problem

It has generally been noted that teachers currently face weak incentives, with pay determined almost entirely by educational attainment, training, and experience, rather than performance and argue that linking teachers’ pay to students’ performance would increase teacher efforts. In many developing countries, incentives for teachers are even weaker than in developed countries. In environments with very weak incentives, it could be argued that the key problem is to get teachers to show up at all. Hanushek (2002) opined that most teaching in many developing countries is by rote and the risk of reducing efforts to stimulate creativity may seem remote without effective teachers’ motivation.

Teacher hiring, funding, firing, and transfer decisions in Nigeria are made centrally by the Ministry of Education. Teachers’ salaries depend primarily on education and experience. There is little opportunity for performance-based promotion or increases to salary. Although incentives provided to teachers by their employers are weak, every school is supposed to have a parent committee and these committees sometimes provide gifts for teachers when schools perform well on the national exams, games and exhibitions. A larger incentive program or teacher-specific incentives would have induced not only increased effective strategies for teaching but also increased effort to improve underlying learning. In the same vein, inability to provide relevant instructional materials to aid learning can also affect the students’ academic performance. In a practical class (e.g Typewriting), mere picture of a typewriter won’t be regarded as a relevant instructional material because it won’t serve purpose that a real typewriter would. Also, the students won’t be able to know how to insert a paper or fix the ribbon which they could have learnt if they had seen and touched a real typewriter.This study therefore, is geared towards finding out if the use of relevant instructional materials could bring a solution to the problem of poor achievement of students in Yaba College of Technology. Hence, the problem of this study is therefore posed as a question; what is the effect of  instructional materials on students’ achievement in Business Education andhow effective teacher incentives improve academic performance of students?

1.2    Purpose of the Study

The main purpose of the study is to determine the impact of teachers work incentives and instructional materials on academic performance of business education students in Yaba College of Technology. Specifically, the study sought the:

i.    Meaning of Teachers Incentives

ii.    Meaning of instructional materials

iii.    Types of teacher incentives

iv.    Factors affecting teacher’s incentives

v.    Impact of Institutional materials on academic performance

vi.    Perceived impacts of teachers’ incentives on students’ academic performance

1.4    Significance of the Study

The successful completion of this study will give more light into the effectiveness of the use of impact of teachers work incentives and instructional materials on academic performance of business education students in Yaba College of Technology, especially where incentives are emphasized. It will also help organizations to know the likely incentives to put in place in motivating teachers.

In addition, it will assist management to engage in staff welfare development in order to improve the output and productivity of employees. This study will also serve as a useful tool for those carrying out further research in this area.

Besides, management will learn how best to assess and apply the various patterns of work incentives in Academics performance, that is the study becomes necessary because it is going to point out ways of how the management will maintain their workers, towards improving their performance so as to increase the productivity of the organization.

This study will be useful to classroom teachers, curriculum planners, students, researchers and parents. For teachers they will be better informed on how to help and guide their students on better way of producing improvised materials with local resources where standardised materials are unavailable or inadequate. The teachers can also engage students to do some of the illustrations during biology instructions.

This study will help to develop problem solving skill in students and will also help student to be more resourceful during lessons. The study could be beneficial to curriculum planners who would design functional curriculum by taking into considerations instructional materials that would be useful to students and teachers

1.5    Research Questions

i.    What does Teachers’incentive mean?

ii.    What does an Instructional material mean?

iii.    What are the types of teacher incentives?

iv.    What are the factors affecting teachers’ incentives?

v.    What are the impacts of an Instructional Material in the academic performance of students?

vi.    In what ways do teacher’s incentives affect students’ academic performance?

1.6    Scope of theStudy

The research topic, “impact of teachers work incentives and instructional materials on academic performance of Business Education students in Yaba College of Technology’’.Restricting the scope/coverage to the study was to ensure uniformity and proper guidance in analyzing the relevant responses to issues tackled in the work.

1.7    Operational Definition of Terms

Work: denoting things or parts made of a specified material or with specified tools.

Incentives: a thing that motivates or encourages one to do something.

Teachers: a person who teaches, especially in a school.

Business: a person's regular occupation, profession, or trade.

Academics: a teacher or scholar in a college or institute of higher education.

Performance: an act of staging or presenting a play, concert, or other form of entertainment.

Instructional: giving detailed information about how something should be done or operated.

Material: information or ideas for use in creating a book or other work.