INFLUENCE OF PARENTAL BACKGROUND ON ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT OF PRIMARY SCHOOL PUPIL IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE IN ENUGU NORTH EDUCATIONAL ZONE

ABSTRACT

The research study examined the influence of parental background on academic achievement of primary school pupils in English Language in Enugu-North Educational Zone. Three research questions and three hypotheses guided the study. An ex-post-facto research design was adopted for the study. The sample consisted of three hundred and eighty eight primary school pupils from eight schools from the study area. An instrument tagged ‘Parental Background and English Language Achievement Test was used to collect data. Expert judgements were used to ensure face and content validity. The Cronbach Alpha, method was used in determining the internal consistency reliability co-efficient of the Parental Background and English Language Achievement Test. The reliability of the instrument was 0.81 and this went to show that the instrument was reliable. The data collected were analyzed using mean and standard deviation to answer the research question. The t-test statistics was used to test the null hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The results showed that the academic achievement of primary school pupils in English Language was influenced by parents’ level of education, parents’ occupation and parents’ residential areas. Among others, it was recommended that parents should endeavour to make out time and resources for their children’s academic pursuits.