Current practices and effectiveness of school chemistry practical work in Tanzania Islands

The study was guided specifically by four objectives, namely, to investigate the current status of chemistry practical teaching in the Tanzania Islands’ secondary schools, to explore the teachers’ and students’ awareness of the role of practical work in teaching and learning in Tanzania Islands’ secondary schools, to investigate the impact of chemistry teachers’ practical work background in the teaching and learning of chemistry and also to investigate the barriers which hinder effective practical work implementation in Tanzania Islands’ secondary schools. The study was conducted in Tanzania Islands in the southern region of Pemba Island where four different secondary schools were investigated. Three categories of respondents were involved, including, chemistry teachers, students who were taking chemistry at ordinary level and heads of chemistry departments from selected schools all constituting a total of 116 respondents. Effective practical work teaching and learning is accompanied with a number of barriers leading to an ineffective teaching of science subjects like chemistry. Descriptive survey design was employed. Stratified random sampling was used to select schools whereby heads of chemistry departments as well as chemistry teachers were selected by purposive sampling method. However, students were selected by simple random sampling. Data were obtained through questionnaires, interviews, classroom observation and documentary review. These data were analyzed qualitatively and quantitatively depending on its type. Findings from the study revealed that chemistry teachers were not competent enough to teach chemistry practical work due to inadequate training in the practical work knowledge and skills during their pre-service teacher training. Moreover, there is a severe shortage of laboratory equipment, chemicals and apparatus. The study concludes that, teachers’ competences in running student practical work lessons are negatively affected by a combination of factors stemming from background of secondary schooling and teacher training related factors coupled with poor environment of practical work provision at school. The study recommends to the MoEVT and school owners to plan for and provide in-service (short term and long term) training, reviewing chemistry syllabus and time accorded for its fulfillment. Further, similar studies on a wider scale are recommended for conclusive purposes how each individual barrier affects chemistry/science practical work teaching in schools in order to reveal.