Arousing and sustaining senior secondary school Students’ interest in Mathematics in Aba north local Government area of Abia State Nigeria

Abstract

This study investigated arousing and sustaining senior secondary school students’ interest in Mathematics. Four research questions and four null hypotheses were answered and tested at .05 significant level respectively. This study employed the descriptive survey research design. Three hundred and fifty (350) s students were sampled from a population of one thousand seven hundred and three (1,703) public senior secondary one (SS1) students in Aba North Local Government Area of Abia State, Nigeria. The purposive sampling technique was used for the sampling. The instrument that was used to collect the data for the study was a researcher structured questionnaire named “Students’ Interest in Mathematics Questionnaire” (SIMQ).  The instrument was rated on a four-point Likert scale with a criterion mean of 2.5. Face and content validity of the instrument was ascertained. Crombach alpha method was used to obtain an internal consistency of 0.86. Mean, standard deviation and independent sample t-test were used for analysis. The result showed that senior secondary students disagreed that they have an interest in the learning of Mathematics. The result also showed that some of the strategies that can be employed by teachers to arouse of students in the learning of Mathematics are mixed modes of assessment, cooperative learning, strategic questioning, games and puzzles. Strategies that can be employed to motivate students in the learning of Mathematics are creating cohesive learning environment, use of technology in classroom, inducing friendly competition, and boosting of students’ confidence by the teacher. All the tested hypotheses showed that there was no significant difference in the responses of the male and female students in all the variables considered. It was therefore recommended that Mathematics teachers should endeavor to use strategies that have the capacity to arouse, sustain and motivate students’ interest in the learning of Mathematics.