CAPACITY BUILDING NEEDS OF SECONDARY SCHOOL CHEMISTRY TEACHERS IN LABORATORY ORGANISATION AND MANAGEMENT IN SOUTH - EAST NIGERIA

Abstract

Chemistry is an abstract subject which requires hands on laboratory activities for effective instruction.  However, research studies report that chemistry teachers do not have sufficient laboratory management skills needed to teach students practical work in chemistry which necessitates capacity building of teachers in laboratory organisation and management. This study investigated the capacity building needs of secondary school chemistry teachers in laboratory organisation and management in South East, Nigeria. Descriptive survey design was employed to carry out the study. Two research questions and one null hypothesis formulated at .05 level of significance guided the study.  One hundred examiners who marked WAEC chemistry practicals were randomly drawn from a population of two hundred and forty examiners who marked WAEC chemistry practicals paper 3 in the South East Nigeria in 2021/2022 session. The instrument for data collection was a validated questionnaire. The reliability index of the questionnaire was determined using Cronbach Alpha Method to be 0.81. Research questions were answered using mean and standard deviation while the hypothesis was analysed using t- test. Results revealed that chemistry teachers need capacity building in all the laboratory management skills; ordering, stocking and storage as well as safety and maintenance skills. There was no significant difference between the mean responses of Enugu WAEC examiners and Abia WAEC examiners on the capacity building needs of secondary school chemistry teachers in laboratory organisation and management. Based on the findings, it was recommended that training and retraining programmes tailored to laboratory management skills should be organized for chemistry teachers in secondary schools.