Development and Experts Evaluation of a Virtual Laboratory System for Teaching Basic Electricity in Nigerian Technical Colleges

This article reports the development procedures and expert evaluation of a Virtual Laboratory System (VLS) designed to support the teaching of Basic Electricity in technical colleges in North-West Nigeria. The system was developed within a Research and Development study using the Analysis, Design, Development, Implementation and Evaluation (ADDIE) model. Six Educational Technology experts assessed 30 proposed development procedures using a five-point suitability scale and evaluated the completed VLS using a 30-item, ten-point implementation rating scale. The development-procedure instrument and implementation rating scale had pilot-study Cronbach’s alpha coefficients of .902 and .966, respectively. Mean and standard deviation were used to analyse development procedures, while the intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) was used to examine consistency among expert evaluations. The five ADDIE phases were all rated suitable; their average mean scores ranged from 4.33 to 4.46, and the overall average mean was 4.42. The developed system integrated digitised instructional materials, circuit diagrams, a virtual workbench using PhET Circuit Construction Kit, practical-report functions and a 25-item computer-based Basic Electricity Test. Expert ratings across the 30 evaluation items ranged from 5 to 10. The average-measures ICC was .863, indicating good reliability of the combined expert ratings, although the single-measures ICC was .174. The findings support a systematic ADDIE-guided development process and indicate that the developed VLS was considered suitable by the expert panel.