Information and communication technology use by senior high school mathematics teachers and students in the Central Region of Ghana

Abstract

The descriptive study was conducted to assess the extent to which Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) use by Ghanaian SHS mathematics teachers and students, and to uncover the factors influencing their ICT use. A cross-sectional survey design employing quantitative method for data collection was used. The population of the study comprised all mathematics teachers and students in Central region of Ghana. A stratified sampling method was used to select 40 mathematics teachers and 200 students. The findings revealed that the extent to which SHS mathematics teachers and students use ICT in teaching and learning mathematics was very low. The Independent samples t-test revealed that the male mathematics teachers use more ICT (Mean = 2.65, SD = 1.12) than the female teachers (Mean=1.51, SD=0.47) and teachers with high self-perceived efficacy use more ICT (Mean = 2.94, SD = 1.10) than those with low self- perceived efficacy (Mean = 1.63, SD = 0.51). The analysis revealed that the differences in the mean ICT use between male and female teachers and self-perceived efficacy in ICT use were statistically significance. The One-way ANOVA test also revealed that students who were above 20 years use ICT more than those below 20 years. The analysis further revealed that the differences in the mean for the use of ICT between students with different ages, school location and availability of ICT resources were statistically significant. It was recommended that the Heads of the various SHS should organise in-service training in professional development courses related to the integration of ICT in teaching and learning mathematics for their teachers.