THE EFFECT OF FAMILY BACKGROUND ON STUDENTS ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE IN SECONDARY SCHOOL: A CASE STUDY OF IN MAINLAND LOCAL EDUCATION DISTRICT OF LAGOS STATE
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CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
An education system in any society reflects and adopts itself to the political and economic circumstances of that society. Nigeria a developing country is not let out in this race to educate her citizens to build her manpower to meet the need of our ever changing world. In accordance with this, various administrations have adopted various policy measures in making sure that the education policy is properly implemented. There had been a change from the old system of education, which was inherited from our colonial masters, to the 6-3-3-4 system. All these are in attempt to establish a good educational system that is geared towards obtaining good performance in educational attainment of students. However, it is rather paradoxical or true that while some students have good performance, others do not have but do poorly in terms of education. When the students are successful, there is no course for concern but when the students are unsuccessful, it gives course for concern. Some countries like Nigeria have been characterized by this kind of lapses.
Much blame has usually been leveled on the school authority as well as teachers’ attitude towards teaching. In this regard very few people care to think of other factors which might be responsible for student’s poor academic performance at school. The factors include usefulness and meaningfulness of materials learnt, mental retardation. Student’s age, classroom atmosphere and student’s home background and so forth. On this account Burt (1937) said that it is convey of backwardness asserted that background of a child affects his educational achievement. In the word of Glenn (1976) background may be due to individual courses such as poor health, emotional disturbances and mental retardation. Family background of students determines how the child views himself and the way he views others. The society is a function of these two factors. In other words, the environment of the child at home determines his behaviour as well as how he relates with others. However, the essential factor inherent in a home or family are the socio-economic, cultural and psychological factors.
Culturally, the behavioural pattern among families differs from each other. While in some there is a sound cordial understanding or relationship between parents and children. While in others, because of the cultural sanctions or taboos they observe their seem to be autocratic atmosphere in the home. This therefore influence student’s behaviour at school as opined by F. Musgrave (1977) students who have much affection from the parents and guardians tend to perform better in school than those who have less or no affection from their parents emotionally, they may become depressed which could hinder their academic performance. The socio-economic status of parents is another decisive factor, which could influence student’s performance. It is observed that students from well to do (affluent) home in most cases are more exposed and tend to do better than those from less affluent or very poor homes.
Since home is the primary unit and agent of socialization from which the fundamental education of the child begins, the success or failure of any student depends largely on the encouragement by members of the family.
1.2 STATEMENT OF PROBLEMS
Education generally, is a continuous process of enculturation, which begins from cradle (birth) and ends in grave. The type of education one receives determines his future potentials. Parents and guardians have ill-feeling about the alarming rate of poor academic performance of students in school nowadays. What they do eventually is to call the teachers to question the pupil’s poor performance. Little do they know that other factors apart from teacher’s abilities such as home background do influence pupil’s academic performance. The home being a primary unit of socialization, where most of children learning take place cannot be single or left out in identifying course of poor academic performance of a child.
1.3 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY
The role of education in any society is very vital and a systematic study into student’s performance will be of immense use to educational planners, teachers, government officials and any other agency or persons that are interested in the progress of the students. The study is carried out to enable parents acquire the basic knowledge which will help in the laying of good foundation for their children there by having good academic performance. This fact has risen because the home has the primary unit of socialization. Through this study, parents may identify the problems of poor home background and learn ways which will enhance good academic performance of their children. To the educational planners, the study will help them to know effect of individual differences which arise from different home background in educational planning and administration. To guidance and counselling officer in the school, the knowledge of home background will enable him advise his students appropriately.
1.4 THE PURPOSE OF THE STUDY
The purpose of the study is to critically examine the influence of home background on students’ performance in mainland local education district of Lagos state. The area of concentration in this research students are :
- Family or home background
- Life style of various social classes
- Family size and students’ academic performance
1.5 SCOPE OF THE STUDY
The study is centralized on student’s performance by the family background and finding lasting solution to this problem.
1.6 BASIC RESEARCH QUESTIONS
The research is geared towards findings solution and the following will be asked:
- What are the causes of poor academic performance by students?
- Are there relationship between the residential area of students and their academic performance?
- To what extent does socio-economic status of parents influence the academic performance of students?
- Are there any relationship between size of the family and the student’s performance?
1.7 DEFINITION OF TERMS
Home: This could be seen as a place where one lives especially with ones family.
Family: This is a group of people who are related to each other, especially father, mother and children.
Background: The traits of ones family it can also be seen as the family way of life.
Performance: To carryout something better improve in ones study.
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