Investigating Factors Affecting Academic Achievement And Response Pattern Of Secondary School Students With Physical Disabilities In Niger State, Nigeria

Although disability is part of human condition and often perceived by people as inability to perform certain tasks, it is, however, not a license to be lazy, but ability to live and be actively involved in academic pursuits by those affected. The purpose of this study was to assess factors affecting academic achievement and aberrant response pattern of secondary school students with physical disabilities. A quasi-experimental design was used. The study adopted 66 teaching staff randomly selected from the 66 public secondary schools from where 121 (59 males and 62 females) students with various and varying degrees of physical disabilities were purposively selected in Niger State of Nigeria. A self-developed questionnaire titled, “Teachers Opinion on Factors Affecting Academic Achievement and Response Pattern of Students with Physical Disability (TOFAA-ARPS-PD) was used to collect data. Data collected were analyzed using descriptive statistics of mean and standard deviation. The findings revealed that, while orthopaedic impairment was the most prevalent disability among students with varying degrees of physical disabilities in Niger State public schools, IRT related teacher-based factors and school-based factors recorded a high overall influence on their academic achievement and response pattern with means of 2.79 and 3.28 respectively. This, however, does not negate the influence of student-related factors (with mean of 2.48) on the academic achievement and response pattern of disabled students. A holistic approach to supporting students with disabilities by addressing student-based factors, teacher-based factors and school-based factors was recommended. Keywords: Physical disability, Aberrant response pattern, Item response theory, School-based factors, Teacher based factors and Orthopaedic impairment