Abstract

The problem of low achievement in Mathematics has been a matter of serious concern to the nation as a whole. Studies from diverse fields continue to search for clues underlying this problem among secondary school students in external examinations. The government and researchers have paid more attention to factors such as use ofinstructional materials, varying the teac ing me 10 , stu ents teacher relationship, training of Mathematics teachers and so on. As part o t ie measures to an est this situation, this study was designed to determine the effect of group counselling on achievement in mathematics among secondary school students. To carry out this study, quasi expeiimental research design was adopted. Three research question and three hypotheses were formulated. The study was conducted in four secondary schools in Uyo education zone drawn through multi-stage sampling technique. Mathematics achievement test (MAT) was used to collect data. Four intact classes were used which were assigned to experimental and control groups, respectively. Two schools were sampled in the rural areas and two schools in the urban areas. The students in the experimental group were exposed to group counselling strategies after which the post test was administered to determine the effect of group counselling on their performances. The students in the control group were exposed to lessons on drug abuse after which the post test was administered to them. The sample consisted of one hundred and twenty (120) students from four secondary schools in Uyo Local Government Area of Akwa Ibom State. Mean and standard deviation were used to answer the research questions while t-test statistics was used to test the null hypotheses at 0.5 level of probability. The study revealed that group counselling strategy had a positive. effect on student’s achievement in mathematics. It also showed that there is no significant difference in the achievement between male and female students based on group counselling but there was a significant difference in achievement in the rural and urban areas. The students in the urban areas had higher scores than those in the rural areas when exposed to group counseling strategy. Based on the findings ofthe study, it was recommended that Akwa Ibom State Ministry of Education and Educational institutions in the state should organize serminars and workshops so as to make school counselors conversant with the process of group counselling as it applies to students achievement. The limitation of the study is that the schools used were selected from just one educational zone out ofsix education zone in Akwa Ibom State. The study could have been more generalized ifschools of the entire educational zone had been represented. Further studies could use group counseling on other subject like English languag