| dc.description.abstract | The Ministry of Education has been long aware of the need to adopt Life Skills Education as a
remedy to the challenges that the youth face. The prevalence of teenage pregnancy, school dropout,
alcoholism, early marriages, drug misuse, HIV/AIDS and STIs among secondary school students
is on the rise. In Emuhaya Sub County, there is a high prevalence of alcohol and drug abuse at
25.74%, approximately 55% of individuals have their first sexual intercourse experience before
the age of 15, crime rates are at 22.69% and the dropout rate of students is 45.3%. The purpose of
this study therefore was to examine teachers’ perceptions on the influence of life skills education
on moral behavior of students in secondary schools in Emuhaya sub county, Kenya. Objectives of
the study were to: establish the extent to which teachers training on life skills education puts
emphasis on moral behavior, establish the extent to which life skills education courses have
incorporated moral behavior content of students in secondary schools, determine the extent of
teachers attitude on life skills education and quality of moral behavior of students in secondary
schools and establish the availability and adequacy of teaching/learning resources on life skills
education on moral behavior of students in secondary schools. A conceptual framework showing
inter-relationships between independent variable, teachers’ perceptions and dependent variables,
moral behavior based on Bandura’s Social Learning Theory was used. The study adopted
descriptive survey research design. The study population was 400 teachers and 1 Sub County
Quality Assurance and Standards Officer. The sample sizes were 196 teachers who were targeted
to participate in quantitative survey. The SCQASO was also purposively selected to participate in
qualitative interviews. Structured questionnaire and a key informant interview were used to collect
data. Face and content validity of questionnaire were determined by experts in the Department of
Educational Psychology. The Reliability of questionnaire was determined through pilot study in
10% of the schools using Test Retest technique whereby Pearson’s r coefficient was used to check
for external consistency of research instruments which was 0.70. Quantitative data from closed
ended items in questionnaire were analyzed using descriptive statistics in form of frequency
counts, percentages, means and standard deviation using SPSS. Qualitative data from open ended
items of the questionnaire were transcribed, analyzed and reported in emergent themes and sub themes. The findings indicated that teachers disagree on the influence of teachers training on LSE
with an emphasis on moral behavior of students in secondary schools, with the overall mean of
2.44. Teachers agree on the extent to which LSE courses have incorporated moral behavior content
of students in secondary schools with the overall mean of 2.51. Teachers disagree on the influence
of teacher attitude on LSE and moral behavior of students in secondary schools with an overall
mean of 2.19 and finally agree on the influence of availability and adequacy of teaching/learning
resources on LSE on moral behavior of students in secondary schools with the overall mean of
2.57. The SCQASO concur with teachers that LSE courses contain moral behavior content and the
availability and adequacy of teaching/learning resources on LSE but disagree with them on
teachers training on LSE and teacher attitude in LSE. Conclusions of the study are: teachers
training did not influence teaching of LSE; LSE courses have an influence on moral behavior
content; teacher attitude in LSE did not influence moral behavior and the availability and adequacy
of teaching/learning resources influence the implementation of LSE. Recommendations from the
study are: the training of teachers in LSE should be looked into; improvements to be made on
incorporation of moral behavior content in LSE courses; teachers providing LSE should have a
positive attitude and improvements to be made on availability and adequacy of teaching/learning
resources so as to enhance quality moral behavior. | en_US |
