THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN TEACHER-RELATED FACTORS AND STUDENTS’ ATTITUDES TOWARDS SECONDARY SCHOOL CHEMISTRY SUBJECT IN BURETI DISTRICT, KENYA

This paper examines the relatonship between teacher-related factors and student’s attudes towards Chemistry subject in secondary schools in Kenya. The paper is based on a study conducted in Buret District in Kericho County, Kenya. This paper highlights issues on the teaching methods used by chemistry teachers, the teachers’ availability to atend to various needs of students on the subject, their use of teaching and learning resources in teaching, teachers’ personal levels of skills and knowledge of the subject mater in Chemistry and the impact of students’ negatve attudes towards Chemistry on teachers’ efectveness. The research design used in the study was descriptve survey. The target populaton comprised Form Four students in ten selected secondary schools in Buret District of Rif Valley Province Kenya. Stratfed random sampling technique was used to select the study sample. Schools were selected from the following categories: Girls’ schools, Boys’ schools and Co-educatonal schools. Simple random sampling was used to select the respondents from Form Four classes as well as a teacher in each school. In all, one hundred and eighty-nine students and ten teachers flled the questonnaires. The data collecton instruments were questonnaires based on the Likert scale and document analysis. Data was analyzed descriptvely using frequency tables, means and percentages while hypotheses were tested using Analysis of Variance. From the study fndings, a number of indicators revealed that there are some factors infuencing students’ attudes towards Chemistry, including lack of successful experiences in Chemistry, poor teaching. It was recommended that science teachers’ should encourage development of positve self-concept of ability among students. Among other recommendatons, the study suggests that guidance and counselling of students in schools should be encouraged, to ensure positve attudes towards and full partcipaton by girls in, the subject. The fndings of this study will be benefcial to the curriculum developers, Kenya Insttute of Educaton as well as Chemistry teachers.


INTRODUCTION
Science is a major factor for change in the modern world. There is an increasing demand for professional practcing scientsts everywhere, as well as a need for others to be educated in these felds. There is rapid increase in scientfc knowledge, which has resulted in a mass of new materials being incorporated into the school syllabus. When considering science curriculum improvement in Kenya, it is essental that the science curriculum provides the kind of learning which relates the student to his environment and that which enables the individual afer school to play a meaningful part in the development of this country using scientfc knowledge.
The desired curriculum is therefore that which can satsfactorily expose the individual student to the scientfc and technological methods-observaton, abstract and verifcaton using topics that have relevance to the Kenyan situaton. What is more desirable is to have a science-teaching programme, which provides opportunity of introducing students to become actve partcipants in science. Science laboratory classes should study diferent techniques and equipments and careful investgaton -keen observaton, accurate recording and good thinking.
Scientfc work demands consistent work and efort. It is beter to establish this fundamental concept in the mind of the student. This requires us to understand and to apply scientfc knowledge rather than pass examinaton. Science afects all aspects of human life. Every person in society requires scientfc knowledge in order to ft in the present society. The approach towards improvement of the science curriculum must start right back at the lower levels of educaton if changes at the advanced levels are to be efectve. Given the changing job market, many women could thus be disadvantaged in their later lives if they have not pursued the required level of science profciency. This is perhaps signifcant because a higher proporton of women today need to be wage earners due to changes in family structure and social role expectatons. Many need to be secure in their jobs and fnancially independent (Njuguna, 1998).
Chemistry, as a science subject, is like a pivot in the Kenyan secondary schools curriculum since other subjects such as Physics, Biology and Agriculture depend on it. The study of Chemistry involves pursuit of truth hence instls diligence, patence and objectvity among learners. Chemistry learning develops the scientfc habits in students, which are transferable to other areas in life. Such habits involve non-reliance on superstton, critcal thinking and respect for other people's opinions. The above qualites when learnt help solve many problems of individual and social living (Das, 1985). Chemistry also prepares students for vocatons and careers at tertary levels of learning and in life generally. The teaching of Chemistry should therefore be done such that learners understand and like it.
During the last four decades, Kenya's secondary school students' Chemistry achievement has remained low (KNEC, 2005) necessitatng several curriculum reviews. The frst post-colonial Chemistry curriculum, developed soon afer ataining independence in 1963, was teacher-and book-centred and therefore inappropriate because it neglected students' abilites, interests and potentals (Government of Kenya, 1976;Kamit, 1984).
Later, curricular atempted to ensure appropriate teaching methods but were not implemented successfully for lack of qualifed Chemistry teachers (Wachanga, 2002). They include the 1970 School Science Project (SSP) and the 1973 Kenya Natonal Examinatons Council Chemistry Syllabus (1973). With the introducton of the 8.4.4 educaton system in 1985, the study of Chemistry became compulsory in Form 1-2 but now many schools ofer it from Forms 1-4. The Chemistry syllabus encouraged small group teaching and teaching through experiments and project. Although curriculum developers wanted Chemistry taught through these learner-based approaches, its teaching in secondary schools remained largely expository (Kiboss, 2001;Mullei, 1987). The class experiment teaching method involved supervised learning actvites with students doing practcal work individually or in groups (Das, 1985) while the Co-operatve Class Experiment teaching method (CCE) incorporates co-operatve learning into class experiments. Slavin (1990) cautons teachers who believe students can simply be placed in groups, given interestng materials or problems to solve and allowed to discover informaton or develop skills. Successful cooperatve learning should always include direct instructon because cooperatve actvites supplement, but do not replace, direct instructons. However, they involve individual accountability because group success depends on member's contributon to a team task.
During the past 15 years, there has been increasing internatonal concern about efectve integraton of women into science and technology. Numerous internatonal conferences have touched on gender and science and technology with many governments publicly acknowledging that efectve development depends on the full utlizaton of all existng human resources. As such, there is need to ensure that woman's capabilites and strengths are recognized and put into full use. Again, without a receptve attude towards instructonal content, learners will have difcultes in acquiring the knowledge and understanding in the cognitve domain, that content retenton is to a large extent dependent on the attude that a learner brings to the instructonal situaton and cannot be over emphasized (Erickson & Erickson, 1984). Anderson, Brown and Race (1998) in their fndings state that "Learning requires actve involvement of the students in constructng meaning rather than receiving more informaton." The learner must negotate meaning with his or her learning community, make connectons with past understanding, and modify these prior conceptons if they are not accurate and built understanding that are part of that person's personal conceptual framework. These new understandings occur in a learning community. Atending to context is an important consideraton in fostering learning in science. Anderson et al. (1998) further elaborate that learning is dependent upon prior conceptons that the learner brings to the experience. The learner must construct Vol. 4(4), 2014, pp 229 his/own learning. Learning is dependent upon shared understandings that learners negotate with others, thus it is imperatve to fnd out what the learners feel about Chemistry as a subject.
Research has shown that learners view utlity of the subject (Chemistry) in both their current lives diferently. Fennema and Sherman (1977) have found out that high school learners who achieve higher levels on Science tests perceive Sciences as being more useful than their lower achieving colleagues. Learners' percepton of Math and Sciences-related careers emerges as signifcant predictor of both Mathematcs and Science achievement and of Mathematcs and Science related courses (Fennema & Sherman, 1977).

Statement of the Problem
Despite the eforts made by researchers to improve secondary school Chemistry curriculum, recent fndings indicate that the level of Chemistry achievement, among other subjects, has remained persistently low (Ministry of Educaton [MOE, 2005]). Researchers have identfed many variables afectng student achievement, especially girls. These include student's social-economic status, availability of learning resources, cultural context, family size, vocabulary of scientfc terms and computaton.
There seem to be limited research on the efect of attude and gender on student performance in Chemistry. The study therefore endeavoured to fll the gap by investgatng the attude that students have towards Chemistry and its infuence on academic achievement. This paper focuses specifcally on the role of teacherrelated factors in shaping those attudes. Many students in Kenya choose to drop science subjects when given a choice and even those who take them; performance is below average (Changeiywo, 2000;Aduda, 2003).
Research fndings and records from KNEC show that the mean scores in Biology and Physics lie between 27 and 32%, while that Chemistry lies between 25 and 26%. The overall performance is below average, worst of all is Chemistry. This diference in performance may be a result of the attudes held by students towards Chemistry. Perhaps the poor performance in science subjects is the one that prompted the government through the Ministry of Educaton Science and Technology (MOEST), with the assistance of the government of Japan through Japan Internatonal Cooperaton Agency (JICA), to undertake a programme to Strengthen Mathematcs and Sciences in Secondary School Educaton (SMASSE) (Changeiywo, 2000). This programme has been implemented in Buret District but students' performance in science stll remains low (KNEC, 2005).
In response to the challenge posed by the poor performance and low enrolment in science, several studies have been carried out in Kenya to investgate the possible causes (Eshiwani, 1984;Kyalo, 1984;Mondoh, 1986;Wachanga, 2005). The majority of the studies centred on the instructonal methods used by the teachers in teaching sciences and Mathematcs. However, Haimowitz (1989) notes that the cause of most failures in schools might not be due to inadequate instructon but perhaps by actve resistance by learners. Head (1988) reinforces this argument by pointng out that students do not like sciences in most cases and therefore it is imperatve that their feelings are considered alongside their thought. Mwamwenda (1995) also argues that the achievement of students in a subject is determined by their attudes towards the subject rather than the inability to study. All these arguments point to the important role that attudes play in determining the achievement of any success. This therefore suggests that favourable attudes towards sciences should be developed if success is to be atained. To be able to do this, a clear understanding of factors which infuence formaton of attudes is essental. This paper therefore examines the relatonship between the attudes held by learners towards Chemistry and teacher-related factors.

Limitatons of the Study
Although the descriptve survey design employed in the study enabled data collecton on many variables, there were increased chances of sampling errors. Despite the fact that the design allowed for a large number of subjects, the number used was small since more subjects could atract increased costs. The few boys' schools in the District and the proportonate sampling technique may not have provided a truly representatve sample and since the design was non-experimental, independent variables might not have been fully controlled.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
The study was conducted in Buret District in South Rif Valley Province. Thirty percent of the Secondary schools in the District are provincial schools while the rest are district secondary schools. The District has a total of 55 secondary schools of which 40 are co-educatonal, eleven are girl's schools, and four are boys' schools. The main concern of the author was the academic performance of students in the Kenya Certfcate of Secondary Educaton (KCSE) natonal examinaton. Buret District has contnued to pose poor results in chemistry in Natonal examinatons.
The study sought to obtain informaton on students' attudes towards Chemistry through questonnaires. As such, descriptve survey method was chosen because it is suited to the study of individual's attudes. The study populaton comprised 189 Form Four students in public secondary schools and 10 Chemistry teachers in ten Secondary schools within Buret District of Rif Valley Province, Kenya. A Chemistry teacher of the selected schools was part of the study because they have a task of preparing and creatng a proper teaching and learning environment. Form Four students were selected because they have been in the school long enough to exhibit the necessary afectve variables. The experience they have gained could enable them think abstractly.
Since it was practcally impossible for the author to access all the schools in the District, only accessible populaton of secondary schools was used. The use of diferent types of schools was adopted so as to provide a representatve sample of the school populaton from Buret District. Stratfed random sampling was used to get students from diferent setngs. This was because there are claims that students in these diferent setngs perform diferently in academic work. In the study, the sample size comprised 10 Secondary schools, 10 Chemistry teachers and 189 students. The total number of respondents was 199.
Data was broken into broad categories for analytcal purposes (parametric and non-parametric). It was then prepared for analysis through coding. Editng and cleaning of the data collected preceded analysis. Data was analyzed using descriptve statstcs, which included use of frequency tables, means, standard deviaton and percentages, while hypotheses were tested using analysis of variance.

Teaching Methods Used By Chemistry Teachers
The author intended to fnd out whether students were comfortable with teaching methods used by Chemistry teachers.  Table 1 indicated that 112 students (60%) were comfortable with the teaching methods while 77 students (40%) were uncomfortable. This seems to imply that more than half of the students sampled were comfortable with the teaching methods used by their Chemistry teachers and were likely to develop positve attude towards the subject. Some of them blamed their teachers for being non-accommodatve to them as slow learners, unapproachable and threatening. One student said, "Our Chemistry teacher threatens us with punishment when we tell him that we do not understand his methods".

Whether comfortable or not
Though teachers with high morale, motvaton and mastery of knowledge, learner difcultes and capacity to facilitate learning are important (Zadra, 2000), correct use of an appropriate teaching method is critcal to the successful teaching and learning of Chemistry. Students may learn names and defnitons of chemical substances theoretcally, but to master chemical reactons, they need to mix the chemicals and observe subsequent reactons. Knowledge of how teaching methods afects students learning may help educators to select methods that improve teaching quality, efectveness and accountability to learners and the public. This is supported by Cole (1989) who gives the fndings of a study where teachers reinforced negatve attudes Vol. 4(4), 2014, pp 231 towards their learners by the materials and methods they used to teach their students their subjects. In another study, Singh (1994) gives results of a study in which teacher attudes were demonstrated. According to him, teachers need to be aware of the values they are transmitng through their lessons and the attudes, which are being cultvated in every aspect of school life.

Chemistry Teacher not being available for Consultaton
Teachers need to bear in mind that students' efectve learning depends on them; they should show interest in their work. The study therefore sought to establish whether or not teachers were available for help when needed outside normal classes.  Table 2. They expressed that they liked the subject because of their teacher. Such teachers were described as helpful. These teachers gave exercises with examples and related subject mater to everyday life. Since teacher atributes were said to have enhanced the students' liking the subject, teachers are therefore a factor in infuencing students' attudes towards the subject. Eight students (4%) were undecided while 38 students (21%) revealed that their Chemistry teacher is not available for extra help outside normal class hours. This could mean that their teachers went home immediately afer classes or were just reluctant to teach overtme.

Response
One student puts it this way: "…our teacher has no interest in me as a learner. He considers my questons silly..." However, the teachers could be having heavy teaching loads and big overcrowded classes, which prevented them from giving extra lessons or individual help to those in need. It could therefore mean that teacher's attudes afect the learner's achievement in the subject.
A teacher who is interested and enthusiastc to help all his/her learners is likely to inculcate positve attudes towards the subject. Women Chemistry teachers ofered poor models to some students in the study. They did not want to be taught by a woman teacher. One girl expressed her opinion as follows: "Women teachers in my experience tend to be moody, when you ask a queston they get annoyed". The revelaton of this result where girls have reservatons about being taught by female teachers needs further research. Whilst it is true that a teacher's behaviour may be responsible for the development of negatve attudes towards Chemistry in students, it is also true that such attudes may result automatcally from doing badly in the subject. Students at tmes blame their teachers for their failure even if the teachers have been hardworking and helpful to them. The relatonship between attudes and performance is certainly the consequence of a reciprocal infuence in that, attudes afect achievement and achievement in turn afects attudes (Ajzen, 1970).
Students must be helped to see the usefulness of Chemistry as applied to daily living. The social context of problems must be exploited rather than teaching it as an abstract and a subject that is unrelated to life. One of the girls put it this way: "Our teacher is mostly in a hurry, we don't understand when he is teaching…. they should be linking it to everyday life, that's why it is difcult". The current trend in science requires the teacher to link what is learnt in class with real life situatons so that the learners can appreciate the subject. This is supported by Jegede (2003), that the study of Chemistry, among other things, would enable the student to know the link between Chemistry and industry, the environment and everyday life in terms of benefts and hazards.

Efectve Use of Teaching and Learning Resources in Chemistry
The study also sought to know from the teachers whether or not the teaching and learning resources and references were efectvely being made use of in Chemistry.  Table 3 that most teachers, 8(80%), revealed that the extent to which teaching and learning resources are being made use of was good while 2 teachers (20%) revealed that practcal work is being done fairly. This implies that most schools have teaching and learning resources, which are being used efectvely, thus the performance in Chemistry is expected to be good.

Response
The instructonal materials such as textbooks, chemicals for laboratories and other physical facilites have been identfed by some researchers as important in students' performance. Bogonko (1992) and King and Hill (1993) have all observed that some schools lack the necessary facilites and instructonal materials, which could enhance the students learning. However, Kenya has done well to train many teachers but the issue of physical facilites and instructonal materials has to be solved in some schools. Muya (2000) blames the head teachers for lack of facilites in the schools. He sees it as lack of priorites because some of the schools visited by the Ministry of Educaton ofcials had big buses, beautful gates but the laboratories are poorly equipped. The observaton made by KNEC is that lack of teaching materials afects student's performance in natonal examinatons.

Teachers' Personal Level of Knowledge and Skills in Chemistry Subject Mater
Ability to teach could also be a result of the teacher having command of knowledge of subject mater at least. The study, therefore, sought to establish the teacher's personal level of knowledge in Chemistry.  Table 4 that 2 teachers (20%) revealed that their personal level of knowledge and skills in Chemistry is fair, while 5 teachers (50%) said that their personal level of knowledge and skill in Chemistry subject mater is good and 3 teachers (30%) revealed that they had excellent personal level of knowledge and skills in Chemistry subject mater. It is clearly shown that more than half of the teachers were competent in the subject they taught. 80% of the teachers in the study had a degree in Educaton Science. It should be mentoned that a teacher could only improve on his/her competence in teaching by reading widely about the subject mater.

Response
Educatonal thinkers are focused on helping teachers to be productve and efectve in their teaching. Bandura (1977) urges that for a teacher to be efectve, he/she should be able to explain complex ideas and processes with patence. As he conducts his/her explanatons, he should speak slowly, patently, clearly, vary his speech to avoid monotony. Teachers' personal morale and motvaton in teaching Chemistry is essental. A Chemistry teacher is expected to like his/her profession. He/she should be encouraged to read widely for selfimprovement and avoid stagnaton. The teacher should be enthusiastc about what he/she teaches because this has an efect on teaching.

Teacher's Inefectveness as a Result from Student's Negatve Attudes
Teachers' inefectveness in teaching Chemistry might not always be their fault but could also result from unfavourable teaching conditons as well as students negatve attudes. The research, therefore, sought to fnd out from the teachers as shown below. Most teachers (70%) in the study revealed that teachers' efectveness is contributed by students' negatve attudes. One teacher (10%) was undecided while 2 teachers (20%) said that students' negatve attude is not a factor in teachers' inefectveness as shown in Table 5.

Response
The 7 teachers (70%) could argue that lack of interest in the subject by the students might have been instlled by their poor background; it would therefore be difcult to convince those who had developed negatve attudes that they could achieve good grades if they worked harder. Thus pupil's lack of enthusiasm to learn Chemistry could reduce teachers' interest to help them. This supports the fndings by Busari (1991) that established a positve relatonship between teachers' quality of teaching and interest of students in science subjects. It was confrmed that some students could not manage to work out problems they considered difcult without the assistance of the teacher.

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
From the study fndings presented above, it is clear that teaching in some cases contributes to students having negatve attudes and that most students did not prefer to be taught by female teachers. Teachers' teaching styles and personality could either inspire or hamper students' progress. Thus teachers and schools have a role to play, but on their own cannot be expected to transform the attudes and behaviour of students, since many students start school with set of cultural values.
However, looking closely at what might instl such behaviours in students, it is evident that this could be blamed on teachers as well as unfavourable learning conditons in school. Some teachers are good at teaching but fail to work efectvely because of the unfavourable conditons of the school. On the other hand, some teachers are the cause for concern because they are inefectve as individuals. The schools' administraton may also be blamed for some conditons in schools.
It is recommended that teachers should improve their teaching methods. Chemistry should be taught in a practcal way through demonstratng its relevance to all aspects of life. Teachers must be gender sensitve. They should counsel girls and generally should spend more tme with the slow learners. More in-service programmes for teachers in the feld should also be mounted. Teachers in training insttutons should also be sensitzed about gender issues before they join the service. Lastly, teachers should provide individual atenton and frequent feed-back to students as need arises. The teachers must always ensure they are available for consultaton by students.