University of Cape Coast Journals
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Change and Continuity in Konkomba Medical Culture: A Historical Perspective of an Indigenous People in Northern Ghana
No full textMedicine (n-nyork) has been one of meaning laden words faced by scholars. This subject has attracted much attention from scholars, but the social aspect of health tied to people’s medical culture has been neglected. The paper examines the reasons and the context within which the medical culture of the Konkomba ensured social equilibrium and well-being. It further examines key medicines and healers that constituted the corpus of the Konkomba health system. Information was sourced from oral interviews, archival and secondary sources. The work focuses on the historiography of indigenous medicine in Ghana, in particular, and Africa in general. In conclusion, it analyses the impact of the Western understanding of medicine indicating that n-nyork (medicine) and ngbanpuan (health) were more holistic within the Konkomba conceptualisation. In that sense, the adoption and non-adaptation of the western view of health has led to more undesirable health situation in the twentieth century. That notwithstanding, the medical culture of the Konkomba still constitute an integral aspect of their medication
Pre-service teacher preparation for early childhood education in Ghana: A review of literature: Pre-service teacher preparation for early childhood education in Ghana: A review of literature
No full textAs a result of the continued interest in the expansion of early childhood education opportunities in Ghana, questions have arisen about how to prepare teachers for work in this context. This literature review explores the state of pre service teacher preparation for early childhood education in Ghana. Findings from the review show that Ghana faces a lot of challenges including lack of trained teachers, poor infrastructure, and poorly developed teaching and learning. The first formal declaration to address early childhood education in Ghana came in the form of the Gold Coast Colony Education Department schedule of 1930, which included a syllabus for infant classes as part of a primary schedule. The syllabus included instruction based on games, physical exercises, spoken English, singing, and arithmetic (McWilliam, H.O.A., & Kwamena-Po, M. A. (1975). After Ghana gained independence in 1957, the Education Act of 1961 was enacted to designate preschool as the responsibility of the Ministry of Education, and also declared compulsory basic education (Kindergarten- Middle school) as free for all children from age Four (4) to age Fifteen( 15). Four years later, the Nursery and Kindergarten Unit of the Ghana Education Service was created. The purpose of that unit was to develop preschools, nurseries, Kindergartens, as well as assist in the evaluation, control, and registration of these institutions. The idea of employing teaching staff who were trained teachers and professionals, led to the establishment of the National Nursery Teachers’ Training Centre in Accra in 1965 to train early childhood personnel (Morrison, 2002). By the year 1975, the Department of Social Welfare supervised 488 day care centres and the Ghana Education Service supervised 567 nursery schools and Kindergartens which enrolled 56,089 children. In an effort to regulate these early childhood centres and their programmes, the Department of Social Welfare established guidelines, which required centres to apply for permit and therefore register with the Department of Social Welfare. The Children’s Act of 1989 was therefore established and put into effect
A comparative study of the effect of the methods of decomposition and base complement addition on Ghanaian children\u27s perfomance on compound substraction: A comparative study of the effect of the methods of decomposition and base complement addition on Ghanaian children\u27s perfomance on compound substraction
No full textThis paper compares the effects of teaching using the methods of Decomposition and the Base Complement Addition (BCA) on primary school children’s ability to solve compound subtraction problems in Ghana. Ninety-six (96) primary 2 children from two schools participated in the study. For four weeks, children in one of the participating schools were taught using the Base Complement method while their counterparts in the other school were taught using the Decomposition method. A pre-test and a post-test were organised for both groups before and after the teaching sessions respectively. In addition, four weeks after the teaching sessions a retention test was conducted. The study revealed that Base Complement Addition method of performing compound subtraction improved the performance of primary school children better than and had a higher power for retention than the Decomposition method. In addition, the differences in performance between the two groups as measured by the effect sizes (0.585 and 0.499 respectively at the post and retention-test levels), was medium and therefore non trivial. Interpretation of these effect sizes has been discussed. In addition, recommendations for teacher professional development, curriculum developers and for further studies have been made
Transgressive Rupture or Subversive Culture: A Semiotic Deconstruction of Staetopygia in West African Cinema
No full textBased on a critical visual analysis of the scopophilia, body fetishism, and commodity culture, I attempt to deconstruct representations of the huge derrières of two actresses in Ghallywood and Nollywood. The analysis pays attention to how cinematographic elements of composition, color, and lighting in selected films the two actresses have starred reinforce the myth of the butt as a signifier of economic and socio/cultural capital. The article raises concerns over whether the hyper-sexualization of West African films points to a transgressive rupture of the industry or a subversive culture of the African ethos of decency
Analysis of Institutional Climate at High perfoming Schools: The case opf St. James Senior High School, Sunyani, Ghana : Analysis of Institutional Climate at High perfoming Schools: The case opf St. James Senior High School, Sunyani, Ghana
No full textA mixed-method design adopting a non-experimental survey and a basic interpretive study was conducted to analyse the institutional climate of high perfoming schools with the focus on Saint James Senior High School. Data was collected using a clsoed-ended Likert type items from a defined population of all 43 academic staff and six managment members of the school and a semi-structred interview protocol from 10 purposeflly-selected heads and assistant heads of departments. The study revealed that there is a positive school climate showing respondents having a high level of institutional identity , strong collegiality, favourable supervisory styles and a good sense of professionalism. These four elements of the positive climate correlate strongly with instituttional effectiveness at St. James Senior High School. The study further revealed that St. James Senior High School has acheived a climate of success through professional development workshops, team refelctive practices and supportive school leadership
Comparative effects of critical thinking and peer-assessment skills training on Ghanaian senior high school students’ achievement in mathematics: Comparative effects of critical thinking and peer-assessment skills training on Ghanaian senior high school students’ achievement in mathematics
No full textThe study determined the comparative effects of critical thinking and peer-assessment skills training on Ghanaian senior high school students’ achievement in mathematics. The non-equivalent pre-test and post-test control group 3x2x2 factorial quasi- experimental design was adopted for the study. Three public senior high schools were randomly sampled to participate in the study and a total of one hundred and thirty- seven (137) students made up of ninety-five (95) in the experimental groups and forty- two (42) in the control group from three intact classes were selected from schools in the Central Region of Ghana. Two mathematics achievement tests, with reliability coefficients of 0.79 and 0.83 were employed by the researcher for data collection. Critical thinking and peer-assessment modules were also developed and used by the researcher for the intervention. The peer-assessment and critical thinking modules were content validated by three experts using percentage of agreement method which yielded 79% and 80% respectively. ANCOVA was used to test the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The findings of the study were that: there was no significant comparative effect of critical thinking and peer-assessment skills training on students’ achievement in mathematics. Furthermore, there was no significant interaction effect of gender, age and treatment groups (critical thinking and peer-assessment) on students’ achievement in mathematics. Based on the findings, it was recommended that teachers can make use of either peer-assessment or critical thinking strategies in teaching mathematics lessons to bring about the much-needed improvement in students’ performance in Mathematics
Service Quality and Customer Acceptability at the Cape Coast Branch of Metro Mass Transit Limited
Get PDFThe paper seeks to examine customer’s perception about the state of public transport in Ghana; assess the extent to which customers are satisfied with Metro Mass Transport’s (MMT) public bus service delivery; and further establish the relationship (if any) among service quality, customer satisfaction, and customer loyalty. A quantitative approach, using questionnaires, was adopted to survey 377 regular students from the University of Cape Coast, who mostly patronize public transport services, especially on vacations, public holidays and school reopening seasons. Data was analyzed, using descriptive statistics and Pearson’s product moment correlation technique. The findings indicate that the respondents’ strongest perception about the state of public transportation was its importance to society. Majority of the respondents were generally dissatisfied with MMTs service delivery; and empirically, there was a weak, negative correlation between customer satisfaction in terms of service quality and customer loyalty. It is recommended that Metro Mass Transit Limited management focus on some quality variables such as safety-comfort-cleanliness; information-communication; accessibility; terminal and stop points performance; and online performance, in order to improve and sustain customer loyalty
Prevalence of overweight and obesity among secondary school students in Ilorin Metropolis Kwara State, Nigeria: Prevalence of overweight and obesity among secondary school students in Ilorin Metropolis Kwara State, Nigeria
No full textObesity became recognized in the classification of diseases 79 years ago (1948-2017). Since then, it has risen exponentially to become a global treat to health affecting different populations. The estimation of obesity prevalence cannot be overstressed. Therefore, this study investigated the prevalence of overweight and obesity among secondary school students in Ilorin Metropolis, Nigeria. A cross-sectional design was adopted for this study; the population for this study comprised all the secondary school students in the metropolis. Multistage sampling method comprising stratified; proportionate and simple random was used to select 1,569 participants for this study. Four research questions and hypotheses were answered and tested for this study. Frequency counts and percentage was used to answer the questions and independent sample t-test was used to test the hypotheses at 0.05 significance level. Anthropometric measures of Body Mass Index. (BMI) and Waist-Hip Ratio (WHR) conducted for classifications into overweight and obesity using percentile ranking. The standardized instruments for data collection were weight scale (BF9015B model) and inelastic tape rule that provides 100g tension. All the measurements for this study were ISAK compliant. The four hypotheses were rejected and the percentage analysis of the data indicated that; 28.1% of the male students in the private schools were obese, 20.1% were obese in the public schools. In the female category, 23.0% were obese in the private schools while 21.8% were obese in the Public schools. The mean WHR for female in the private and public schools were 0.87 and 0.80 respectively. It was concluded that; overweight and obesity was prevalent in the schools but higher prevalent was recorded in the private schools. Regular participation in physical activity and routine assessment of overweight and obesity status of the students using BMI and WHR methods for monitoring and timely interventions were part of the recommendations
Perception of JHS students and parents about technical and vocational education in Cape Coast Metropolis, Ghana : Perception of JHS students and parents about technical and vocational education in Cape Coast Metropolis, Ghana
No full textDespite the numerous benefits of technical vocational education and training (TVET), most students and parents still prefer the traditional academic education. This study investigated the views of students and parents about TVET in Cape Coast metropolis of Ghana. The study employed cross-sectional descriptive quantitative survey approach. A total of 395 questionnaire forms were recovered (out of 570), making a return rate of 69 %. Of these, 242 were administered to students (132 from public schools and 110 from private schools) and 153 were administered to parents. The respondents were selected through stratified random sampling technique. The data were analysed using percentages, mean and standard deviation as well as t-test of independent samples. The results of this study revealed divergent views: findings indicated that the JHS students’ response generally indicated negative perception towards TVET, while their parents’ response generally indicated positive perception of TVET. The study finally offered some recommendations that can enhance the outlook of TVET programmes in the minds of younger people and parents
Effects of three counselling interventions on attitude to and involvement in bullying among senior secondary students in Owerri, Nigeria: Effects of three counselling interventions on attitude to and involvement in bullying among senior secondary students in Owerri, Nigeria
No full textThis study investigated the effects of three counselling interventions on attitude to and involvement in bullying among senior secondary students in Owerri, Nigeria. Four hundred and twenty students drawn from twelve senior secondary schools were chosen for the study. The schools were assigned the social skills training, inhibitory modelling, persuasion or the waiting-list control. The participants were exposed to 6 weeks, one-hour weekly, training designed to change their attitude to and involvement in bulling behaviours. Two research instruments were used for data collection. Similarly, two research hypotheses were formulated in the study. The hypotheses were tested using 2 x 4 Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA). The findings show that the counselling interventions successfully modified students’ attitude to bullying. The counselling interventions were equally effective in reducing the students’ involvement in bullying. However, the inhibitory modelling was superior to persuasion and social skills training in modifying the participants’ involvement in bullying. Based on the findings, it is recommended that an anti-bullying policy be formulated at both junior and secondary school levels