Home based factors influencing secondary school students’ discipline in Nzaui Sub-County, Makueni County, Kenya

Abstract

This study sought to identity the home based factors that influence discipline among students in public secondary schools in Nzaui Sub-county, Makueni County, Kenya. The research objectives of the study were to determine the influence of parental economic status, parenting styles and family background on discipline among secondary school students in Nzaui Sub-County. The research design adopted in this study was the descriptive survey. Due to the high number of students in the district, the study used simple random sampling to select a representative sample. The Slovin’s formula was used to sample 385 students and 136 parents for inclusion in the study. The study sampled 10 head teachers who responded to the interview guide. The study sought to establish the relationship between students’ discipline and the parental economic status, the parenting styles and the family background. Using the interview guide to the head teachers, and questionnaires administered to the students and parents, data was collected from the respondents. It was analyzed quantitatively using frequencies, percentages, Pearsons’ correlations and regressions. The study established that indiscipline problems are prevalent in public secondary schools and that both parental economic status and family background do not significantly influence the discipline of students. However the study established that parenting styles do significantly affect student discipline. The study recommends that parents should find more time of being involved with their children, be more caring and friendly, in addition parents who offer relaxed parenting style for their students and have good jobs ought to be over restrictive to their children by not giving them a lot of freedom.