Laboratory Work and Retention of Oscillatory Motion Concept by Physics Students in Bonny Island, Rivers State

This study was aimed at investigating the effect of laboratory work on Physics students’ retention of oscillatory motion concept in Bonny Island, Rivers State. Quasi-experimental design research was used for the study. The study had a sample of ninety-nine (99) SS2 Physics students, selected using random sampling. Three research questions and three hypotheses guided the study. Two validated, researcher-constructed research instruments titled ‘Oscillatory Motion Performance Test’ with a reliability coefficient of 0.77 obtained using the Kuder-Richardson 21 formula, and ‘Oscillatory Motion Retention Test’ which was a reshuffled version of the first instrument, were used to collect data for the study. The research questions were answered using mean and standard deviation while Analysis of Covariance was used to test the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The findings of the study showed that the use of laboratory work was significantly more effective than the lecture method in enabling the retention of oscillatory motion concept by students. Furthermore, a significant difference was found between the male and female students in their retention of oscillatory motion concept, in favour of the female students. The findings further revealed that the female students taught oscillatory motion using laboratory work retained most while the male students taught using lecture method retained least. The interaction of instructional method and gender on students’ retention of oscillatory motion was however not significant. It was therefore recommended that laboratory work should be intentionally integrated into the teaching of secondary school physics concepts.