ABSTRACT
This research was conducted in Garissa Teachers’ Training College to investigate the impact of perception on the academic performance of student teacher in science subjects at Garissa teachers’ training college in Garissa District Kenya owing to repeated poor performance. Various literatures from previous authors on the subject were cited. Generally, it was found that a learner’s perception on a subject or concept affects the interest, understanding and thus academic performance. Other factors that were found to affect performance in the subjects included the availability of physical facilities in the college, student’s motivation by their teachers, teacher’s classroom practices, teacher’s personal qualities and sociocultural! religious beliefs, The research used descriptive survey method to collect data. During the study, it came out clearly that most of the respondents were below 25 years and most of those over 25 years were married. Most of these feared science arguing that they studied it long time ago or their spouses discouraged them. It also came out clearly that learners are not adequately motivated to learn science. Socio-cultural /religious beliefs of the students negatively affect academic performance according to the findings. The largest identified factor that negatively affected learning and thus performance of science was luck of adequate and relevant physical facilities such as laboratory, chemical reagents, apparatus and equipments. It was recommended that there is need for improvement of the teaching approaches and motivation of learners by the teachers. Teacher’s qualities should be improved through in-service trainings for them to improve the attitude of the learners towards science. Adequate physical facilities such as science laboratory, college farm, equipments, reagents and library should be provided and in serious situations improvisation should be encouraged. Students should be educated to alleviate the misconceptions that arise as a result of socio-cultural and religious beliefs.
