By Mbah Agnes
This study investigated the effect of technique of song (TS) on Junior Secondary students’ achievement and interest in French essay writing. It also examined the influence of gender and school location on students’ achievement and interest in the subject. Ten research questions and 10 hypotheses were formulated to guide the study. The research was pre-test, post-test (test re-test), quasi-experimental type, using non-equivalent pretest posttest control group design. The purposive random sampling technique was used to select two public single sex junior secondary from urban and rural areas in Nsukka, Enugu State. Two hundred and one (201) JSS 11 French students from four intact classes constituted the sample for the study. In each selected school, one arm of JSS 11 was randomly selected through balloting and assigned to the treatment condition, the other was assigned to the control group. The same was done for the rural schools. The experimental group was taught with TS while the control group was taught with the conventional technique (CT). Treatment lasted for four weeks. Two instruments used for data collection were face validated by three experts and their reliability index were .57 and .72 respectively. Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA), mean and standard deviations were used to analyze the data collected from this study. The findings of the study are: TS had significant effect on both students’ achievement and interest in French essay writing; gender and location had no significant influence on students’ achievement and interest in French essay writing; interaction effect of TS and gender/location on students’ achievement in French essay writing was not significant and interaction effect of TS and gender/location on students’ interest in French essay writing was not significant. A major contribution of this study is in the area of enhancing of students’ achievement and interest in French essay writing. The findings have shown that teaching French essay writing using TS can enhance the achievement and interest of students. The difficulty in teaching and learning the subject could be reduced through the use of TS which has been found effective in enhancing students’ understanding of French essay writing. One major implication of these findings is that when TS is used in teaching French essay writing, learning becomes effective. Based on the findings, it was recommended among others, that curriculum planners should infuse TS in teacher education programmes so that teachers can use it to teach essay writing.