ABSTRACT

This research was designed to evaluate the implementation of the national curriculum for Basic science in South East, Nigeria. Specifically, the study intends to determine the extent of achievement of the aims and objectives of the national curriculum for Basic science, the availability and adequacy of materials and facilities needed for effective teaching and learning of the subject in South East  zone, find out the extent of utilization of available resources, compliance by teachers on the use of recommended teaching methods, quantity and quality of teachers, the evaluation techniques employed by teachers in getting feedback, find out gender and location influences on Basic science curriculum implementation and identify  factors that militate against the proper implementation of the Basic science programme in upper basic Schools in South East, Nigeria. The study involved the collection of data and the use of data to assess the effectiveness of the quality of the reformed science programme. Nine research questions and seven null hypotheses were formulated for the study. The descriptive survey design was adopted for the study. The target population for the study comprised all the upper basic 111 students of South East Nigeria numbering about 146,637 from which a total of thirty (30) upper basic schools were sampled for the study while the research was carried out in the five South East states of Nigeria including Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu and Imo states but sampled three states: Abia, Anambra and Imo states as representatives for the study. The instruments used were questionnaires and interview schedules which were validated by three experts – two from measurement and evaluation and one from Integrated science Departments. Cronbach Alpha reliability method was used to ascertain the reliability of the instrument and reliability indices of 0.81, 0.79, 0.71, 0.89, 0.77, 0.80, 0.82, 0.69 and 0.83 were obtained for the instruments which were later administered to 557 respondents (512 students and 45 Basic science teachers) in order to gather the necessary information for the study. The descriptive statistics frequency, percentages, ratios, mean and standard deviations were used to analyze the research questions while the t-test statistic was used to analyze the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance and 43 and 555 degrees of freedom for teachers and students respectively. The result of the study revealed these findings:  the materials and facilities needed for effective implementation of the Basic science programme in South East Nigeria is grossly inadequate, available instructional materials are not well utilized by teachers for instruction, teachers compliance to use of recommended teaching methods is poor, qualified Basic science teachers are not enough in schools, evaluation techniques employed for feedback are adequate, gender has no influence in the implementation but school location exerts great influence on Basic science implementation and lastly many other factors that hinder Basic science curriculum implementation abound. Finally, recommendations were proffered to enhance the effective implementation of the  Basic Science programme in upper basic schools in south east Nigeria, some of which were: federal and state governments should make it a point of duty to provide well-furnished Basic Science laboratories to schools and not basing on senior secondary science laboratories. more qualified Basic science teachers should be recruited to schools to ensure sound foundation of scientific skills and Basic science teachers should strive to teach the subject within the context of the recommended teaching methods enshrined in the curriculum and government should from time to time involve experts to evaluate Basic science implementation paradigms in schools to enable her be well informed of how far the programme is achieving its desired objectives as well as tackling its inherent challenges.