Teachers’ and students’ perceptions on the influence of selected factors on performance of students in Kiswahili language at KCSE in secondary schools in Njoro Sub-County, Nakuru County, Kenya

Abstract

Kiswahili is one of the most widely used languages for communication in the world. It is a lingua franca for Eastern Africa and the neighbouring countries. In Kenya it is the national language of communication. It is also one of the core subjects taught in secondary schools’ curriculum. However, the performance has not been good. The purpose of this study was to investigate teachers’ perception on the influence of selected factors on students’ performance in Kiswahili language at KCSE level in public secondary schools in Njoro Sub-county. The study adopted a descriptive survey research design. The target population of the study was 3256 students and 55 Kiswahili teachers while the accessible population comprised of 2340 students and 55 Kiswahili teachers from 19 public secondary schools in Njoro Sub-county. Probabilistic sampling formula by Krejcie & Morgan, (1970) was used to select a sample size of 330 students from the 19 secondary schools. All the Kiswahili teachers from the accessible population participated in the study through census method. Questionnaires were used to collect data from the sampled respondents. These instruments were validated by supervisors, professionals and research experts from the department of Curriculum and Instruction and Education Management of Egerton University. Cronbach’s Alpha was used to measure the level of internal consistency of the items in the instruments to ascertain its reliability. The alpha coefficient for the teachers’ questionnaire was 0.82 while that of students’ questionnaire was 0.81 and therefore accepted for this descriptive study. Data was coded then analyzed with the help of Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 20. The results were presented using percentages, means and frequency distribution tables. The study found that there was a positive relationship between the teachers’ workload and students’ performance in Kiswahili language but not significant at the 0.05 significance level as indicated by a correlation coefficient of 0.053 and a p-value greater than 0.05. The study also reported a positive and significant relationship between instructional materials and students’ performance in Kiswahili language as supported by correlation coefficient of 0.317 and a pvalue less than 0.05. It was established that there was a positive and statistically significant influence of teachers’ attitudes towards Kiswahili on the performance of students in the subject due to a correlation coefficient of 0.497 and a p-value less than 0.05. It was also revealed that students’ attitude towards Kiswahili language positively and significantly influenced their performance in the subject as denoted by a correlation coefficient of 0.147 and a p-value of less than 0.05.This study may be beneficial to all education stakeholders in Nakuru County and Kenya at large as it is hoped to shed light on how selected factors influence Kiswahili performance at KCSE level. The findings in this study may be useful to the Ministry of Education and school administration to take a corrective measure in improving Kiswahili language performance. The study may contribute to the wider knowledge, both in research and academics since the findings of the study may help future researchers, as a basis for further studies on Kiswahili language.