Influence of Teacher’s Competence on Students Learning in Some Selected Secondary Schools in Buea Municipality in the South West Region of Cameroon

Awandia Joseph Tazitabong, Ph.D
Lecturer, Department of Curriculum Studies and Teaching, Faculty of Education, University of Buea, Cameroon
DOI – http://doi.org/10.37502/IJSMR.2021.4809

Abstract

This study examined “The Influence of Teacher’s Competence on Students’ Learning in Some Selected Secondary Schools in Buea Municipality. Four research questions were formulated to guide the study. The study adopted a survey research design. The target population of the study consisted of 5,992 students, drawn from six secondary schools that where selected using a stratified sampling technique. The accessible population consisted of 703 form four students drawn from the six schools. The sample size was made up of 300 students. This sample size was obtained using a simple random sampling technique. A closed-ended four-point Likert scale questionnaire was used for data collection. To ensure the reliability of the questionnaire, the instrument was pilot tested in a school not included in the study. Their responses were subjected to Cronbach’s Alpha Coefficient reliability test which yield a value of 0.713.  The data was analyzed using the Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient. The findings revealed that there exists a significant positive relationship between teachers’ professional, pedagogic, socio-emotional, personality competence and students’ learning in secondary schools in Buea Municipality. Based on the findings, the following recommendations were proffered; teachers should partake in seminars/workshops if possible because this will improve their teaching competence; educational administrators should equip the regional pedagogic inspectors with sufficient pedagogic didactic materials that they can use to train or carry out in-service training for the teachers doing seminars/workshops, principals should encourage mentor-mentee relationship among teachers of the same department because this will help train the novice teachers on all the aspects of competence and this will intend booze their self-esteem. And lastly, the decision-makers should recruit more trained teachers so as to reduce the teacher-student ratio. This is very important because teacher competence can only be effective in a classroom that meets the international standard of the teacher-student ratio.

Keywords: Teacher’s professional competence, pedagogic competence, social-emotional competence, personality competence, and students learning.

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