DIGITAL LEARNING DEVICES UTILIZATION AND LEARNING EFFECTIVENESS AMIDST COVID-19 PANDEMIC IN UNIVERSITIES IN KWARA STATE, NIGERIA

Abstract

The disruption in the academic calendar of universities in Nigeria as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic has made many universities to shut their doors in compliance with the directives of the Federal Government as a way of containing the spread of the virus among the academic, non-academic staff and students. With the closure of schools, many private universities in Nigeria resorted to the use of digital learning devices as a way of ensuring that teaching and learning activities are unhindered amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. The study adopted descriptive design of explorative type. The study population are the 8566 undergraduate students of the four private universities in Kwara State. Random sampling technique was adopted to select the 860 participants that took part in the survey. Two validated researcher-design questionnaires tagged “DLDQ” and “LEQ” were used for data collection. Major findings revealed that a positive significant relationship exist between digital learning application and learning effectiveness in private universities in Kwara State (r = 0.409; p < .000). The study recommended that university students should be encouraged by the school authorities at the point of admission and registration to get digital learning devices such as laptops or tablets for effective and meaningful learning activities to take place.