Impact of Local Language on Academic Performance of Nursery Pupils

Abstract

The study investigated the impact of local language on the academic performance of nursery school pupils in Mathematics, Basic Science and Agricultural Science. The pre-test-posttest control group experimental design was adopted for the study. The population for the study was 180 pupils. A sample of 120 pupils was used for the experiment and the remaining 60 participants served as the control group. Four research questions and four hypotheses were developed for the study. Two research instruments (multiple-choice items) were used for the analysis. Expert judgement was used to ascertain the validity of the instrument. Kuder Richarson formular20 was used to establish the reliability of the instruments. The instruments were administered to the pupils. Mean, standard deviation and percentage were used to answer the research question, while a t-test was also used at a 0.05 level of significance to analyze the hypotheses. The findings revealed that local language has an impact on the overall performance of the pupils. The subject-by-subject analysis of the three subjects equally shows that using the local language in teaching nursery pupils at an early stage will improve academic performance compared to those taught in English language. Conclusions were drawn and recommendations were equally made.