Relationship between Learning Styles and Mathematics Academic Achievement of Secondary School Students in Awka Education Zone

Abstract

Academic achievement of students occupies a very important position in learning process, thus, understanding its relationship with student’s learning style preference is an important consideration when designing classroom instruction. This study determined the relationship between learning styles and students’ Mathematics academic achievement in Awka Education zone, Anambra State. The study adopted a correlational research design. A multi-stage sampling procedure was adopted and used in selecting a sample size of 1,241 students from a population of 6,279 students in public secondary schools. A validated questionnaire titled, Learning Style Questionnaire was used to collect data for the study. The questionnaire has reliability coefficient alphas of 0.68, 0.64 and 0.77 on each of the learning style cluster. The questionnaire was administered through direct delivery approach. Data was collected and analysed using percentages and Pearson Product Moment Correlation Coefficient. Findings from the study revealed among others that; there is very low negative relationship existing between the secondary school students’ visual learning style and their achievements in Mathematics in Anambra State; there is very low negative relationship existing between the students’ auditory and kinesthetic learning style and their achievements in Mathematics in secondary schools. Similarly, the findings revealed that the relationship existing between the secondary school students’ visual, auditory and kinaesthetic learning style and their achievements in Mathematics is not significant. Based on the findings, the following recommendations among others were made that teachers should take into account their students ‘diverse learning styles in order to design instructional methods that take care of those diversities and remain sensitive of such during the instruction process.