Abstract

The study examined the efficacy of instructional scaffolding strategy on senior secondary school students’ achievement in Biology in Makurdi Metropolis, Benue State. Two research questions and two hypotheses guided the study. A quasi-experimental research design involving pre-test, post-test control group was adopted. The population of the study was all the senior secondary two (SSII) students in Makurdi Metropolis in all the Government-owned public schools with an estimation of 16321. Random sampling technique was used to select six intact classes with 217 students as the samples size for the study. A 50 item Biology Instructional Scaffolding Strategy Achievement Test (BISSAT) was used for data collection. The BISSAT was validated by three experts and a reliability coefficient of 0.84 obtained using Kuder Richardson's formula 20 (KR-20). The experimental group was taught Biology using instructional scaffolding strategy while the control group was taught the same topic using lecture method. The treatment lasted for four weeks. Descriptive statistics of mean and standard deviation was used to answer the research questions, and analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) was used to test the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The study discovered among others that students taught with instructional scaffolding strategy have a significantly higher achievement than those taught with lecture method. Based on the finding, it was recommended among others that Teachers should employ instructional scaffolding strategy for effective teaching and learning of Biology.