Abstract:
HIV/AIDS affects learners’ psychosocial wellbeing and resilience, which are critical for effective learning and progression in education. There is therefore a need to create awareness on facts HIV in institutions of learning. Success in HIV/AIDS awareness hugely depends on how the information is packaged for easier comprehension by the learners. The information should be in a form that is easily understandable by the learners. This can be achieved through contextualization of information and provision of opportunities for learners to create their own understanding of HI/AIDS. Audio-visual media as a teaching aid has the ability to contextualize information and provide opportunity for active learning. A teaching aid entitled “Elotutoengima” (The Fire is coming) was developed and implemented among the Maapeopleto contextualizing the information. The audio-visual aid is about a popular local folk tale of a man who was told of a fire that was coming and he ignored. The folk tale is given as a warning to people who like dismissing vital information. To contextualize the information, the video was shot in a village set up involving all ages and gender and demonstrated practices that predisposed the community to HIV/AIDS and the interventions measures that were being taken. The video takes 30 minutes after which the teacher uses the learners’ experiences with the video and in the village to facilitate a discussion on cause, effects and prevention of HIV/AIDS. This allows learners to construct their own understanding about HIV/AIDS. A two-group comparison survey design is used to measure the effectiveness of video by the use of a pre-test before the leaner are exposed to the video followed by a post-test three months after exposure to the video. Learners’ awareness (knowledge) of facts about HIV/AIDS and attitude towards HIV/AIDS is measured by the test. The results have revealed that this video significantly increases learners’ knowledge of facts about HIV and positively improves their attitude towards HIV/AIDS. The study recommends that HIV/ AIDS information in schools should be contextualized to the learners’ environment. The study also recommends that learners should be given opportunity to create their own understanding of HIV/AIDS knowledge.
