ABSTRACT

The study investigated the effects of individualized instruction and inquiry methods on student’s achievement and retention in secondary school physics in Akwa Ibom State. The study employed pre-test, post-test quasi experimental design. The population of the study consisted of 2114 SS11 students made up of 1,077males and 1,037 females in Ikot Ekpene education zone in Akwa Ibom AKSEB2017/2018.Simple random sampling technique was used in the selection of education zone while purposive sample was used in the selection of three schools out of 8 government owned secondary schools in Ikot Ekpene education zone in Akwa Ibom.Those schools became experimental groups and control group in which a sample  of 150 students.50 students for individualised instruction,50 students for inquiry method and 50 students for control group was done respectively. The research was guided by four research questions and four null hypotheses tested at 0.05 level of significance. Two validated researcher made instruments; Physics achievement Test (PAT) and Physics Retention Test (PRT) were used for collection of data. The reliability coefficient of both instruments was established using Pearson product moment correlation coefficient (PPMC) which was 0.813 and 0.834 for PAT and PRT respectively.Descriptive statistics; Mean and standard deviations were used to answer the research questions, while the analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) was used in testing the hypothesis at P < 0.5 level of significances. The findings of the study showed that students taught with individualized Instruction improved significantly than those taught using inquiry and lecture method. Also male students retain Physics concepts better than their female when expose to individualized instruction, inquiry and lecture method. However there was no significant difference in the mean retention scores of male and female students in Physics when taught with individualized introduction, inquiry and lecture method. Based on the finding of this study it was recommended that serving teachers should use individualized instruction on other topics in Physics to enhance their mastery of the concepts being taught.