Determination of Teaching Methods for Improving Students’ Interest in Automobile Technology Education Subjects in Colleges of Education in South East, Nigeria

Abstract

The study was conducted to determine teaching methods for improving students’ interest in automobile technology education programme in colleges of education in South East, Nigeria. Two research questions and two null hypotheses guided the study. Descriptive survey research design was adopted. The entire population of 68 automobile technology educators in the eight public colleges of education in South East, Nigeria was studied without sampling. A validated four-point rating scale questionnaire containing 17 items was used for data collection. Cronbach alpha co-efficient used to establish the reliability of the instrument yielded an overall coefficient of 0.78. Mean and standard deviation were used to answer the research questions while t-test was used to test the null hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. Findings of the study revealed that activity-based teaching methods and interactive teaching methods can improve students’ interest in automobile technology education programme in colleges of education in South East, Nigeria. The study concluded that the utilization of activity-based methods such as (project-based method, group investigation method, internship method, experiential method and apprenticeship method) and interactive teaching methods like (think-pair share method, group discussion method, guest speaker presentations method, brainstorming method and interactive whiteboard method) will not only improve students’ interest in automobile technology education programme but can also equip them to diagnose and repairs automobiles effectively in the society.Among others, it was recommended that curriculum planners should incorporate activity-based and interactive teaching methods into the curriculum of automobile technology education in colleges of education to equip teacher-trainees with the instructional competencies to appropriately use them in teaching automobile technology education courses.