Article Details

This study investigated the effect of field trip instructional strategy on science students’ achievement and retention in ecology in Sokoto State, Nigeria. Quasi-experimental design of non-equivalent pretest and post-test control group was employed for the study. Two research questions and two null hypotheses guided the study. The population of the study comprised 5,207 SS1 students in public coeducational schools. The sample of the study comprised 125 SS 1 students from two intact classes randomly selected from public coeducational secondary schools in South Senatorial District, Sokoto State, Nigeria. Ecology Achievement Test (EAT) was used as instrument for data collection. The reliability of EAT was determined using Kuder-Richardson formula 21 (KR21) and this yielded a coefficient of 0.79. Mean and Standard Deviation were used to answer the research questions while Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA) was used to test the null hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The findings of the study revealed that a significant difference existed in the achievement of students taught Ecology concept using field trip instructional strategy and conventional method in favour of the field trip instructional strategy. Based on the findings of this study, it was recommended that teachers should be encouraged to use field trip instructional strategy in the teaching of Ecological concepts.