Rethinking Mathematics Instruction for Students with Mathematical Disabilities in Learning Mathematics in Junior Secondary Schools in Sokoto Metropolis

Mathematics instruction has been given much attention in recent times by scholars, given the problems encountered by students in their attempt to learn mathematics. Mathematics learning disabilities (MLDs) were noticed to be strongly behind some of these problems experienced by students especially at primary and junior secondary school levels of mathematics learning. To get to the root of this problem, in an attempt to have a re-think in mathematics teaching approaches, a certain study approach was developed by the researchers and was named Special Mathematics Teaching Strategy (SMTS) and was compared with Conventional Mathematics Teaching Strategy (CMTS). In an attempt to establish the viability of both teaching approaches, a study was carried out at the junior secondary school level in Sokoto metropolis; in which a sample of 357 students was used. The instrument used is: T&Y Mathematics Achievement Test (T&Y-MAT). Hypothesis raised was tested at 0.05 level of significance. Pretest-posttest experimental design was further employed to establish the difference between the mean performances of students using both strategies. This was done using t-test. The research in the end, found out that the SMTS is a good strategy for teaching students with mathematics disabilities but require teachers' commitment, dedication and perseverance. Lastly, some recommendations were offered as to how this problem could be reduced drastically if this strategy advocated is judiciously utilized.