Students' Achievement in Physical and Health Education: Effect of Discussion Teaching Method

Recently, poor results have been recorded by students in Physical and Health Education in external examinations. This situation may be attributed to the teaching methods adopted by the teachers. Therefore, this study ascertains the effect of discussion teaching method on junior secondary school students' achievement in PHE. Two null hypotheses were postulated. Quasi-experimental non-equivalent control group pre-test post-test design was adopted. Using purposive sampling, two co-educational schools in Nsukka L.G.A. were selected of which experimental and control clusters was determined through balloting. The sample consisted of forty JSS2 students from two intact classes of 20 students each. Physical Education Achievement Test was used for data collection. Pre-test data were collected from both clusters as baseline data before the experimental cluster was exposed to the teaching method. At the end 8weeks, post-tests data were collected using same instrument to determine the effect of discussion teaching method on the students' achievement. The null hypotheses were tested using ANCOVA at .05 level of probability. From the results, the experimental cluster attained higher Mean Gain, and discussion teaching method enhanced the students' achievement (p=.007). However, no significant difference was found based on gender (p=.088). The study concludes that discussion teaching method is very effective in the teaching and learning of PHE in theory, therefore, the subject should be structured towards active and participatory learning. Also, PHE teachers should be re-trained on the job and more time should be allotted to PHE in the schools to enable effective application of discussion teaching method.