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CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background to the Study

This research investigates into communication skills and junior secondary school

students’ academic performance in English language in Katsina-Ala Local Government Area of

Benue State. To succeed in any endeavor in life, you must acquire the necessary skills. A

successful driver must have the skills to drive carefully, cautiously, and safely. A plumber must

possess the skill as a professional (Hager, 2008).

. To pursue your studies successfully, i.e. Pass all your examinations, acquire the required

knowledge and be equipped to function in your chosen career and contribute meaningfully to

your society, it is crucial to understand and acquire specific learning and communication skills.

The concept of communicative skills has evolved a lot, encompassing areas of knowledge today

increasingly wider. Communicative skills are considered by many authors as a global capability

comprising communicative capacities of individuals acquired throughout life. They can be

improved by applying a special methodology that would help develop communicative skills.

Communication is essential in your life, studies, career and general interaction with

others. Every activity of your life, career or pursuits involves communication. Communication is

a bridge that connects people, places and/or machines. The world and all its systems cannot exist

without one form of communication or the other (Barnard, 2018). In fact, without

communication, the world is flat, motionless and uninteresting. Communication is vital to the

advancement of our environment and society in general. Effective communication helps students
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or employees to eliminate confusion and turn every member into a valuable team player.

However, ―when employees communicate poorly, whole projects fall apart (Zook, 2019).

At all levels of education, students must be able to communicate effectively. Without

well-developed communication skills, children run the risk of falling behind their peers or

becoming emotionally overwhelmed or withdrawn at school. The academic excellence of any

child depends solidly on communication skills, beginning with clear oral communication.

Students are often called upon in the class to answer questions. These questions may range from

those with simple factual answers to questions that involve putting thoughts together and making

arguments. Answers to questions need to be communicated effectively so that teachers can assess

a student’s knowledge (Bhasin, 2018).

Students with oral challenges may also be embarrassed if they are unable to communicate

on parity with their peers. If a student stutters or mumbles, he/she may become fearful of

speaking up in class, and this in turn can lead to lowered grades and diminished self-esteem. This

made Denesi (2009) to define communication as the process by which information is exchanged

between individuals. This is to say that communication is much more than words going from one

person’s mouth to another’s ear. In addition, messages are transferred by the tone and quality of

voice, eye contact, physical closeness, visual cues and overall body language. Communicative

skills are therefore, those skills that are acquired through special training or proficiency and one

is able to perform a task effectively. As a result of this, communicative skills are generally made

up of four basic the skills, namely: listening, speaking, reading and writing. The order in which

they are listed here conforms to language development, since the oral skills (listening and

speaking are acquired before the graphic skills/ reading and writing). It is a fact that students first

listen before they try to imitate what they hear by attempting to speak. Reading and writing are
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skills which are learnt later in life to facilitate effective communication. Listening is a “selective

process by which sounds communicated by some sources are received, critically interpreted and

acted upon by a purposeful learner” Jones as cited in Nguaigba and Henda (2007).

To Aganyi (2007), listening refers to the ability to use the organs associated with hearing

and the brain in order to achieve a complete understanding of utterances and information.

Listening is very important to a student as it improves his competence in academic work. For a

student to express himself clearly, the act of understanding sound without print translates to the

ability to understand without difficulty in the spoken English. It is obvious to note that for a

student to perform outstandingly in academic work, it is only through effective listening and

well-managed exposure that students will be able to learn in using context and identifying the

right sounds and words in both their correct context and position. It is also necessary for him/her

to learn to analyze information as it is received from its source in order to sort what is of

substance from what is trivial or useless.

The importance of speaking skills cannot be over-emphasized. For example, all normal

students show that they understand their environment through speech; also much of what

students do on daily basis involves speech. Articulation as an aspect of speech should be given

prominence on achieving fluency. Therefore, if student do not learn how to speak or do not get

any opportunity to speak in the classroom, they may soon get demotivated and loss interest in

learning thereby performing academically poor (Danesi 2009). Swan (1985) supported the idea

by saying “students learn to speak by speaking” and that goes for teachers as well as students.

The more students are able to practice speaking, the more they do better by improving on their

oral skills. Therefore, students should be able to speak in front of one audience and they will

certainly improve academically.

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Reading skills have been interpreted in different ways by diverse scholars. To Ogar

(1993), reading is the interpretation of printed symbols into speech or its mental equivalent.

Reading requires mental and physical activities which involves understanding, interpretation,

evaluation and appreciation of the read materials. Aliyu (1996) defined reading as “a way of

building up meaning from what has been put down in written form. Reading is thus a form of

communication through which the content, challenges and claims made by a writer are a

pathway that tries to capture the substance of the written materials”.

1.1 Theoretical Framework

The Speech Act Theory (1969)

This study has adopted Speech-Act Theory as a guide. The Speech Act Theory was

propounded by John Searle (1969). Searle explains how messages express the speakers’

intentions. Traditionally, meaning was viewed as the referents of words and grammar, but the

speech Act Theory widens the concept to include the expressed intention behind utterances. This

line of work provides the basis for a sufficient view of communicative skills. Searle believed that

meaning in language derives from the way in which it is actually used in concrete situations.

Clearly embedded in the pragmatic usage, this idea captures the importance of how people use

communicative skills to accomplish certain objectives within school situations. He referred to an

utterance (speaking) as a legationary act, which is the act of making speech sounds. Speaking as

the rule-based production of sounds is a kind of performance which enables students to speak in

the academic environment. It is pertinent to note that the speech act theory is important because

the speaker and the listener share background information; this is because the speaker and the

listener become active and engaged in participation by interpreting the larger context. When

people deliver a speech act indirectly or violet rules in some other ways, they are relying on

conservational implications, or inferences that listeners could be expected to make. This theory
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focuses on the ways in which communications rely on constitutive and regulative rules to

coordinate their action by constructing meaning at several levels. The flow of interaction

proceeds on the basis of how the participants (speaker and listener understand one another’s

speech acts and the regulative rule that guide their responses to these.

Therefore, using this theory to link the research topic which is communicative skills and

student’s academic performance in public secondary schools implies that communication of

language begins with spoken sounds combined with gesture. Students first learn to receive

information by listening and understanding what they hear and then experiment it with

expressing themselves through speaking. Speech begins as repetitive syllables, followed by

words, phrases and sentence. Later, students learn to read and write. Students should learn how

to put these skills in practical form and should be motivated to improve upon their

communicative skills; students with higher need for achievement have greater academic

performance.

1.2 Statement of the Problem

It is observed that many students in post primary schools perform poorly due to

insufficient knowledge of communicative skills (listening, speaking, reading, and writing) which

forms the foundation for their educational attainment. This is mostly reflected in the results of

their final examinations. This is due to their inability to handle their communicative skills,

mechanical accuracy, as well as lexis and structures. The relevance of communicative skill

cannot only be limited to one discipline, but it cuts across all fields of human endeavour.

Language is our primary source of communication.

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It is the method through which students share their ideas and thoughts with others,

communicative skills are important for all fields of endeavour, whether a student is from

sciences, commercial classes etc. and this knowledge or skills makes them to perform well

academically. Having a firm grasp of communicative skills will undoubtedly be a key role in

students’ academic success. Often times, students with great technical skills in other disciplines

reach a point in their careers where they are no longer considered knowledgeable because of

their inability to pose the sound knowledge of communicative kills, any field of study will be

empty if students cannot communicate their desire for advancement, write a decent report or talk

about their ideas and achievements. A student who has full command of communicative skills is

considered intelligent and his self-esteem naturally increases and can do better in all fields of

study. It is therefore, imperative that these students be equipped with the correct communicative

skills, if this is not done, it manifest significant deterioration in their academic performance.

1.3 Purpose of the Study

The purpose of this study is to investigate into the relationship between students’

communicative skills and academic performance of students in public secondary schools in

Katsina-Ala Local Government Area of Benue State. The specific objectives of the study are to:

i. Determine the extent to which listening skills affect academic performance of

students.

ii. To ascertain the extent to which speaking skills pose a challenge to the students’

academic achievement.

iii. To find out the extent to which reading skills affect the academic performance of

students

iv. To find out the extent to which writing skills affect students’ academic achievement.
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1.4 Statement of Hypotheses

The following hypotheses are formulated for the purpose of this study:

i. There is no significant relationship between listening skills and students’ academic

performance.

ii. There is no significant relationship between speaking skills and students’ academic

performance.

iii. There is a relationship between reading skills and students’ academic performance.

iv. There is a relationship between writing skills and the academic performance of

students.

1.5 Significance of the Study

There is a general perception from parents and guardians on the falling standard of

students’ academic performance. This could be related to the students’ inability to express

(communication skills) themselves in a constructive and coherent writing during examinations.

The study on students’ communicative skills and academic performance in public

secondary schools could be of paramount importance to academics, students and other

researchers in this area. This is because the findings of this research will serve as a stepping

stone for further research.

1.6 Scope of the Study

The study is primarily concerned with communication skills and students’ academic

performance in public secondary schools in Benue State, particularly at SS1 level, this is because

it is the foundation of senior learning in secondary school.

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The conceptual scope include listening, speaking, reading, and writing skills, these

variables were used as milestone in ascertaining the students’ academic performance on

communicative skills.

1.7 Operational Definition of Terms

The research is of educational, private and public interest. To facilitate the understanding

of the study therefore, the following term are operationally defined:

Communication Skills: Are skills that students acquire through special training or proficiency

and is able to perform a task effectively in terms of listening, speaking, reading and writing.

Listening Skills: The ability to use the organs associated with hearing and the brain in order to

achieve a complete understanding of utterances and information.

Speaking Skills: An activity that involves the sender of the message (speaker) and receiver

(learner).

Reading Skills: The interpretation of printed symbols into speech or its mental equivalent.

Writing Skills: Entails putting words together on a paper in form of letters, reports, projects,

assignments, and examinations etc. that are meaningful.

Academic Performance: Ability to obtain educational achievement successfully, or operate

efficiently in school.
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