TEACHER PERCEPTION AND UTILIZATION OF ASSISTIVE TECHNOLOGY FOR EFFECTIVE TEACHING AND LEARNING AMONG DISABILITIES STUDENTS

The study examined teacher perception and utilization of assistive technology for effective teaching and learning among disabilities students. Two research questions and two hypotheses were answered and tested in this study. A descriptive research design of survey type was used. The population for this study comprised public senior secondary school teachers in Ijebu Ode local government, Ogun State. Sample size was 132 teachers and purposive sampling technique was used in the selection process. Researcher developed questionnaires; titled: Teachers Perception, Utilization of Assistive Technology and Effective Teaching and Learning Questionnaire (TPUATETQQ) was used for data collection with 0.88 as reliability coefficient level. Frequency counts, percentage and bar-chart were used for presenting and analysing demographic characteristics of the respondents. Mean and standard deviation were used for analyzing research questions. Hypotheses were tested using Pearson Product Moment Correlation (PPMC). The findings of the study revealed that there was low level of teachers’ perception on assistive technology for effective teaching and learning among disabilities students and that there were low level teachers utilize assistive technology for effective teaching and learning among disabilities students. It was also found that there was significant positive relationship between teacher perception on assistive technology and effective teaching/learning among disabilities students (r = 0.517, p < .05). (r = 0.668, p < .05) and there was significant relationship between teacher utilization of assistive technology and effective teaching/learning among disabilities students (r = 0.668, p < .05). It was recommended among others that both government and other stakeholders should organize workshop, seminars and other capacity building training regularly for teachers as means of updating their knowledge and skills in the use of assistive devices considering the dynamic nature of special education technology. Special Education teachers should be encouraged to deploy assistive technology for learning irrespective of their gender. Keywords: Teacher Perception, Utilization, Assistive Technology, Effective Teaching-Learning, Disabilities Students Word Count: 297