Assessment of materials used in the teaching of vocabulary in senior secondary schools in Ilorin-West LGA, Kwara State

Abstract

No text comprehension is possible, either in one’s native language or in a foreign language, without understanding the text’s vocabulary. This study analysed a plethora of materials used in the teaching of vocabulary in senior secondary schools in Ilorin West LGA of Kwara State, Nigeria. The descriptive research design of the survey type was employed in the study. The study population included all senior secondary school teachers of English language in Ilorin West LGA. All the 211 sampled teachers were purposively selected. The data collected through the questionnaire adopted from Abiola (2012) were analysed using percentage, mean rating, and the t-test at a 0.05 alpha level using SPSS 20.0 for Windows. A reliability coefficient of r = 0.89 was obtained. The researcher found that English language teachers teaching vocabulary in senior secondary schools in Ilorin West Local Government Area made more use of adapted passages and realia (real-life/concrete objects). Conversely, these teachers never made use of MP3 audio CDs and slides at all. There was also no significant difference between private and public school English teachers’ use of instructional materials for teaching English vocabulary. The implication is that public school teachers do not use instructional materials for teaching English vocabulary differently from their private school counterparts. It was therefore recommended that teachers update their professionalism by constantly attending seminars, workshops, in-service training, and reading academic journals and related research studies.