Effect of Computer Aided Instruction on Senior Secondary Students’ Achievement in Reading Comprehension in Jalingo, Taraba State, Nigeria

This study investigated the effect of computer aided instruction on SS II students’ achievement in reading comprehension in Jalingo Local Government Area of Taraba State. The study was guided by two research questions while two null hypotheses were formulated and tested at 0.05 level of significance. The research design was pre-test, post-test quasi-experimental design. The population comprised of 4,615 SS II students. A total of 80 students located in two intact classes were used for the study. Purposive sampling technique was used to sample the schools while random sampling was used to select the classes. Reading Comprehension Achievement Test (RCAT) was the instrument used for data collection. There were two groups in the study (experimental and control group) and both groups were exposed to pre-test in order to establish their homogeneity levels prior to intervention. Post-test was administered after five weeks of intervention. The experimental group was exposed to reading comprehension lessons using CAI while control group was taught using the conventional method. Descriptive statistics of mean and standard deviation were used to answer the research questions while inferential statistics of Mann-Whitney U test and Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA) were used to test the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The result revealed that there was no significant difference between the mean achievement scores of students taught reading comprehension using CAI and those taught using the conventional methods (p = .880).The findings also showed that there was significant difference in the mean achievement scores of male and female students taught reading comprehension using CAI in favour of the female students (p = .287). Based on the findings, it was therefore recommended that teachers of English language should introduce the use of CAI in teaching reading in order to enhance students’ achievement in reading comprehension. It was also recommended that textbooks writers and publishers should incorporate computer as a teaching strategy and provide the required guide for adopting it.