Remedial education in the teaching and learning of social studies: an examination of its effectiveness in selected junior secondary schools of Mongu district.

The major concern of the study was that despite having remedial education programmes in junior secondary schools, the performance in social studies by most pupils is undesirable given the persistence of underperformance in social studies by junior secondary school pupils exposed to remediation in some schools in Mongu. The purpose of this study was to examine the effectiveness of remedial education in the teaching and learning situations of social studies in junior secondary schools as perceived by remedial social studies teachers, social studies HoDs, school administrators and junior secondary school pupils. The study was guided by the following objectives; Examine the effectiveness of remedial education in the teaching and learning of social studies at junior secondary schools; Establish how remedial education program in the teaching and learning of social studies is conducted in junior secondary schools; Investigate the challenges that affect the effectiveness of remedial education in the teaching and learning situation of social studies in junior secondary schools. The study used interview questions to collect data from, social studies teachers, social studies HoDs and school administrators. Focus group discussions were used to collect data from junior secondary school pupils. Qualitative thematic analysis was used to analyze the collected data. The collected Data was clustered into themes in line with the objectives of the study. This study revealed that secondary school social studies teachers in Mongu district had no adequate knowledge and understanding of remedial education. The results also revealed that most of the secondary schools did not significantly benefit from remedial education due to lack of policy for guidelines, student and parental attitude. The study, therefore, concluded that remedial education in the teaching and learning of social studies in secondary schools of Mongu was not very effective. The study recommended that there is need for the government through the Ministry of Education to revise and review the Zambian secondary school remediation policy, train all secondary school teachers on how to administer remedial lessons and provide adequate support to promote effective remedial education.