PERCEPTION OF SCHOOL LEADERS AND TEACHERS TOWARDS COOPERATIVE LEARNING PRACTICES IN SECONDARY SCHOOLS OF ARSI TICHO SUB ZONE, OROMIA REGIONAL STATE

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate the perception of school leaders and teachers towards CL practices in the Secondary Schools of Arsi Ticho Sub Zone. To achieve this purpose, the descriptive research design was employed. Questionnaire, interview and documents were used as instruments of data collection. Data was collected from 7 secondary schools of Arsi Ticho Sub Zone. A total of 114 teachers and 88 School leaders (7 PTA Chairman, 7 supervisors, 14 Principals and Vice Principals, and 60 Department Heads) were involved in the study. The data was analyzed using frequency, percentage, and narrative description. To check whether there existed a significance difference between the opinions of SL and teachers, t-test was employed. The finding of the study revealed that the SL and teachers have not given much attention to the implementation of CL practices in the classroom. The SL focused on administrative activities and teachers were use talk and chalk only to cover the portion. There is a perception difference between teachers and school leaders. Some of the challenges which hinder the implementation of CL practices were the resistance of teachers to participate in the implementation of CL practices, lack of commitment of SL and teachers to help the learners effectively, lack of Students’ motivation, and lack of budget that help the school to full fill the resources. Improving the method of preparing organized and participatory plan, develop the attitude of SL and teachers, and enhancing the participation of teachers by guiding, supporting and motivating them were some of the mechanisms that used to improve the implementation of cooperative learning. Developing the awareness of SL and teachers through training and experience sharing, mobilizing the community for budget allocation, give support for teachers to develop CL practices, discussing with teachers to avoid the resistance to practice CL in the classroom, improving the method of preparing participatory plan and improve the participation of teachers and leaders in implementation of cooperative learning practices are the recommendations of the study.