Influence of internet utilisation and academic performance of secondary school students in Ijebu-Ode, Ogun State, Nigeria

Abstract

Internet holds a great promise for humanity and indeed for academic performance of students. It is a known tool for learning and can guarantee universal access to quality education. The study examined the influence of Internet utilisation on academic performance of secondary school students in Ijebu-Ode, Ogun State, Nigeria. The study is a survey with SSS1 and 2 students as subjects; using multi-stage sampling, 310 secondary schools students from ten selected public and private secondary schools formed the study sample. Questionnaire with reliability value 0.70 was used to gather data for the study. The data collected was analyzed using the Pearson Product Moment Correlation test, mean and standard deviation. The results reveal that internet use has great benefits for students in school work and in class assignments; most students spend more time on chatting, downloading of documents and watching of videos than any other activity. The use of the internet by the students was found to positively influence their academic performance (r = -0.157; p<0.05). The study concludes that the Internet is critical to modern life and learning and that schools need to direct policy and practices in fostering technology use. The study recommends awareness campaigns, regulations to guide the extent of internet usage and responsible use through training and seminars for students and teachers