ABSTRACT
The study examined the attitude of students towards the teaching and learning of health education in selected Junior Secondary Schools in Mainland Local Government Area of Lagos State. The descriptive survey design was used in this study. 819 participants selected through random sampling technique from five Junior Secondary Schools comprised the sample for the study. The descriptive statistics or frequency counts and percentages provided answers to research questions while the chi-square (X2) statistics was used for hypotheses testing. The results revealed that: Attitude of the students influenced teaching and learning of Health Education (X2cal = 38.04 < X2tab 15.21, df = 8, P > 0.05). Also that attitude of teachers influenced Health Education (X2cal = 43.3 < X2tab 66.9, df = 9, P > 0.05). While motivation influenced students behaviour towards Health Education (X2cal = 16 < X2tab 14.07, df = 7, P > 0.05). Also, teachers personality influenced students’ attitude (X2cal = 28.1 < X2tab 14.07, df = 7, P > 0.05) and teaching method influenced students attitude towards Health Education (X2cal = 26.01 < X2tab 16.91, df = 9, P > 0.05). It was concluded that: the attitude of students significantly influence teaching and learning of health education in the school. Students who participate in Health Education often show non-challant attitude towards the subject. Teachers significantly influence the teaching and learning of health education in Junior Secondary Schools. Teachers show negative attitude towards teaching and learning of Health Education which influenced the attitude of students toward the subject. Attitude significantly influence the teaching and learning of health education in schools. The implications of this show that attitude counts a lot in everything human being do. Teachers do not motivate the students in order to develop their interest in learning Health Education. For instance many teachers do not use teaching materials to illustrate their teaching process and they do not have mastery of content and this makes students to lose interest in the subject. The knowledge of health education significantly influences the teaching and learning of health education in the Junior Secondary Schools. This implies that many students who learn Health Education have poor background in the subject. Finally, it was found that the teaching method of Health Education significantly influences the teaching and learning of health education in schools. Based on the conclusions reached in this study, the following recommendations were made by the researcher.
(1) Students should endeavors to have or develop more interest and zeal on the subject, health education, as it will enable them to learn the subject better and to perform well in it.
(2) Teachers should ensure that the students are well motivated so that they would learn well the health education teaching.