EXPLORING PHYSICS TEACHERS’ KNOWLEDGE AND THE NEED OF PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT IN ZAMFARA STATE, NIGERIA

Abstract

Teaching is view as knowledge-rich profession. The quality of teacher basically depends on teacher Content Knowledge (CK) and Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK) and this contribute to students’ academic performance. This study therefore assessed physics teachers’ knowledge justified it on the need of professional development in Zamfara state. The target population comprised 40 physics teachers teaching physics in the secondary schools in Gusau educational zone. Simple random sampling technique was used to select 32 physics teachers. The instrument used for data collection was a paper pencil test tagged as Criterion Assessment Test (CAT). The CAT was used to assessed physics teachers content knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge. The instrument was validated, pilot tested and having a reliability coefficient of 0.89 using Crombach’s alpha coefficient. The findings revealed that physics teachers are averagely knowledgeable in terms CK and PCK to teach physics at secondary schools as their mean score is 57.6%. However, the significant different existed between qualified and unqualified physics teachers’ knowledge; the significant different existed among physics teachers’ knowledge based on experience, though it is between highly experienced and less experienced, moderately experienced and less experienced but no

significant different between highly experienced and moderately experienced. There was no significant different between physics teachers’ knowledge based on gender. The findings indicated the need of professional development for physics teacher in Zamfara state especially unqualified physics teachers and newly incoming teacher. It was recommended among others that professional development should beprovided for physics teachers