Abstract:
Multicultural concepts are taught in social studies to promote students’ intercultural competence. However, reports have shown that many public secondary school students are deficient in knowledge of, and attitude to multicultural concepts in Oyo State, Nigeria. Previous studies largely focused on teacher and student-related factors influencing students’ learning outcomes in multicultural concepts, with little emphasis on interventions through collaborative instructional strategies. This study, therefore, was conducted to determine the effects of Peer Study Circles (PSC) and Project-based Learning Strategy (PBLS) on junior secondary school students’ learning outcomes (knowledge and attitude) in Multicultural Concepts in Social Studies (MCSS) in Oyo State, Nigeria. The moderating effects of ethnic background and gender were also examined.
The Socio-metric and Social Learning theories were adopted as the framework, while the pretest-posttest control group quasi-experimental design with a 3x2x2 factorial matrix was used. Six Local Government Areas (LGAs) were randomly selected in Oyo State. Six public junior secondary schools (one per LGA), with at least two ethnic groups, were purposively selected. The participants in the schools were randomly assigned to PSC (64), PBLS (60) and Control (56) groups. The instruments used were Multicultural Knowledge Test (r = 0.81), Multicultural Attitude Scale (r = 0.76) and instructional guides. The treatment lasted eight weeks. Data were analysed using descriptive statistics, Analysis of covariance and Bonferroni Post-hoc test at 0.05 level of significance. The participants’ age was 11.40±2.03 years, and 60.0% were female. The ethnic distribution of the participants was Yoruba (61.1%), and Non-Yoruba (38.9%). About 55.0% students had low knowledge of MCSS, while 66.7% had poor attitude to MCSS. Treatment had a significant main effect on knowledge of MCSS (F(2;177) = 5.82; partial 2 = 0.06). The participants in PSC obtained the highest post mean knowledge scores (11.11), followed by those in PBLS (11.04) and control (8.023) groups. Treatment had a significant main effect on attitude to MCSS (F(2; 17) = 6.47; partial 2 = 0.07).
The participants in PSC (10.08) obtained the highest post mean attitude score, followed by those in PBLS (8.86) and control (7.13) groups. There was a significant main effect of gender on knowledge of MCSS (F(1;178) = 5.43; partial 2 = .03) but not on attitude. Male students obtained higher post mean knowledge score in MCSS (10.55) than their female (9.18) counterparts. Ethnic background did not have a significant main effect on knowledge and attitude. Ethnic background and gender had significant interaction effects on knowledge (F(1;178) = 8.50; partial 2 = .05), in favour of male Yoruba participants in PSC group.
There were no significant interaction effects of treatment and gender, as well as treatment and ethnic background on knowledge and attitude. The three-way interaction effects were not significant on knowledge and attitude. Peer study circles and project-based instructional strategies enhanced junior secondary school students’ knowledge of, and attitude to multicultural concepts in social studies in Oyo State, Nigeria. Both strategies should be adopted in teaching multicultural concepts in Social Studies for improved students’ learning outcomes, with particular attention to gender.
