Effect of Multimedia Instructional Strategies on Secondary School Students' Academic Achievement and Retention in Basic Science and Technology in Makurdi LGA, Benue State

The study investigated the effect of multimedia instructional strategies on secondary school students’ academic achievement and retention in Basic Science and Technology in Makurdi LGA. Four research questions were asked and answered and four hypotheses were tested at 0.05 level of significance. A pre-test post-test quasi-experimental research design was adopted for the study. The population of the study was 7,834 upper basic two students. Simple random sampling techniques was used to sample 84 (46 Male and 38 Female) students in two intact classes from the population. Basic Science and Technology Achievement Test (BSTAT) and Basic Science and Technology Retention Test (BSTRT) were used as instrument for data collection. A reliability coefficient of 0.88 was obtained using, kuder-Richardson 20 formula. Data were analyzed using mean and standard deviation, to answer research questions while the null hypotheses were tested using analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA). Findings of the study showed that there is a statistically significant difference between the mean achievement and retention scores of students taught Basic Science and Technology with multimedia instructional strategy and those taught using lecture method amongst others. Based on the results of the findings, the researcher concludes that the method employed in teaching Basic Science and Technology has significant effects on students’ achievement and retention. Students significantly achieve higher and retained more when taught using multimedia instructional strategy. Therefore, it was recommended amongst others that Basic Science and Technology teachers should endeavour to use multimedia in the teaching of Basic Science and Technology, especially in secondary schools.