DOI: 10.58920/edu0202779 ISSN: 3123-6103

Group Discussion and Students' Academic Performance in History Among Secondary School Students in Mbeya City, Tanzania: A Descriptive Comparative Study

Hope Sheyo
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This study compared History achievement between six secondary schools in Mbeya City, Tanzania: three using structured group discussion and three using the conventional question-and-answer method. Teaching method was assigned at the school level, and no school contributed students to both conditions, so teaching method is completely confounded with school identity; the study is therefore reported as descriptive, exploratory comparative evidence, not a statistical test of causal effectiveness. A quasi-experimental, pretest-posttest design was used with 120 students, balanced across Forms One to Three in each condition, over a six-to-seven-week intervention, with data from a 20-point History achievement test given before and after. Students in the group-discussion schools recorded a higher mean post-test score (M = 12.92, SD = 2.05) than students in the question-and-answer schools (M = 10.40, SD = 1.85), and a larger mean gain (7.73 versus 4.93 points). Student-level t-tests, ANCOVA, and Cohen's d are also reported (adjusted mean difference 2.48 points, F(1, 117) = 47.86; post-test d = 1.29), but, because treatment was assigned to only six school/class units and is fully confounded with school, these are descriptive summaries rather than confirmatory evidence of a treatment effect. Qualitative evidence from teacher interviews, focus groups, and observations was consistent with this pattern. The findings describe an observed difference between six participating schools under monitored conditions; they do not, alone, establish that group discussion caused it, since school-level factors could not be separated from teaching method in this design.

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