Impact of participatory teaching on students’ generic skills in tertiary education

Abstract

This paper presents findings from empirical study on assessing third year students’ academic performance and development of generic skills through participatory teaching. Generic skills inventory and academic performance were utilized as measuring instruments where as activities of participatory learning used as an independent variable. The main purpose of the paper was to explore the extent to which participatory teaching contributes to students’ acquisition of generic skills and obtaining outstanding academic standing. Outstanding academic achievement and development of generic skills much depend on the instructional strategies employed in teaching and learning. Participatory learning approaches are those, which put students at the center of the teaching and learning activities. Through participatory teaching strategies, the acquisition of generic skills becomes more enjoyable, meaningful and exciting. The study identified that participatory teaching is an effective way to foster generic skills of students as it has a significant influence on development of students’ generic skills and to improving students’ academic performance. The result of the correlation analysis shows the strong positive relationships between the variables of academic performance, generic skills as well as activities of participatory teaching. As result of this, this study proves that participatory teaching produces two core outcomes (better academic performance and possession of generic skills) expected students develop during academic course. A comprehensive model of generic skills development was proposed which consists of the three constructs investigated which are indicating the strength and the direction of their relationships.

Keywords: Correlation analysis, participatory teaching, generic skills, academic achievement.