Abstract:

This study was aimed at finding out the relationship between the continuous assessment (CA) and examination scores of students in four (4) courses taught in the Primary Education Studies (PES) department of College of Education, Agbor, Delta State of Nigeria. This is further intended to determine the effect of a strategy of continuous assessment which has been adopted for ten (10) academic sessions (2003/2004 - 2012/2013) in order to improve observed flagging attendance to lectures and enhance students’ active participation during lectures. The strategy was also used in obtaining fair measures of lecture attendance of students for large class sizes. In this strategy, students were given written quizzes or classroom activities related to the objectives of the lectures. The activities and quizzes are short enough for the students to respond to them and submit within a period of not more than ten (10) minutes in a one hour lecture. Students were informed that the marks they obtained from their responses to classroom activities will constitute over ninety percent (90%) of their continuous assessment scores in the courses. Not more than two assignments are given to them to make up the remaining ten (10%) per course. In this way they were made aware of the importance of attending lectures and being alert during lectures in order to obtain CA scores in the courses. The rating of continuous assessment scores to examination scores is 40:60 in all the Colleges of Education in Nigeria. The courses used in this study are the Basic Science and Technology components of the curriculum of PES in the minimum standards for Colleges of Education in Nigeria. They are as follows: PES 114 (for 100 level or year one students); 211, 225 (for 200 level or year two students) and 325 (for 300 level or year three students). In these courses, relevant ‘minds-on’ and ‘hands-on’ activities are determined by the lecturer prior to the lecture to be used for continuous assessment. Speed and accuracy in providing and submitting responses within the lecture period were taken into consideration also. All the students who were taught these course listed above for the past three (3) sessions 2010/2011, 2011/2012 and 2012/2013 were used for this study. Their continuous assessment scores were correlated with their examination scores for each of the courses in each of the three academic sessions. The Pearson product moment coefficients were computed for each pair of scores for each course in each academic session. The twelve (12) coefficients computed are all positive and significant at 0.05 level of significance. This indicates a positive and significant relationship between the CA scores and the examination scores. Those who had higher CA scores (who also attended more number of lectures) had higher performance in the examination. The reality of these findings is portrayed in the experience that performances in the courses can be clearly explained by the students themselves. They usually perceive of themselves as being at risk of failing or performing poorly when they fail to attend lectures for the courses. Discussions and recommendations based on the results of this study are included to encourage the use of continuous assessment in more pragmatic ways to enhance students’ attendance to lectures and other leading non-cognitive correlates of their academic performances, in all courses in Colleges of Education.

Keywords:

Continuous Assessment, Correlation, Academic Performance.