Think-Pair-Share and Peer-Tutoring as determinants of students' retention in Biology

Abstract

Concerns on how to improve academic achievement, retention capacity and critical thinking skills in Biology has steadily gained attention in Nigeria. These have necessitated the call for a more interactive and student–centred instructional strategies. This study examines Think-Pair-Share and Peer-Tutoring as determinants of students’ retention in Biology using a quasi-experimental research design. The study was guided by two research questions and two null hypotheses tested at 0.05 level of significance. A total of 172 Senior Secondary School II (SS 2) students from three in-tact class of three co-educational schools in Somolu Local Government, Educational District II of Lagos State, Nigeria participated in the study. The respondents were assigned to three groups: Think-Pair-Share (n=56), Peer-Tutoring (n=56), and a Control group (n=60) taught using conventional lecture methods. The Instrument for data collection was a 30-item Biology Achievement Test (BAT) and four instructional guides were developed and validated by experts in Biology Education and Curriculum. The reliability of the instrument was established using Kuder-Richardson KR20 formula (KR-20) at coefficient of 0.84. The intervention lasted for six weeks. Data collected were analyzed using mean, standard deviation and Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA). The study revealed a statistical significance in Biology Achievement Test scores across the three groups, with think-pair-share and peer-tutoring group scoring higher. However, the students assimilated better with Peer Tutoring. The study concludes that student-centred strategies such as peer-tutoring significantly enhanced students’ retention in Biology. It recommends the training and retraining of biology teachers towards the implementation of peer-tutoring and think-pair strategies and the call to curriculum developers for the inclusion of active learning models into the Senior Secondary School Curriculum.