Biology is a core and required science subject offered at the upper secondary school level in the Nigerian educational system. However, students’ attitude towards the subject is poor, a trend probably due to the use of teacher-centred educational strategies. Scholars have thus advocated for the need to adopt innovative educational strategies to enhance students’ attitude towards biology. This study investigated the use of consensus and cooperative reflective journal writing educational strategies in enhancing students’ attitudes towards biology in two Local Government Areas (LGAs) within Ibadan Metropolis of Oyo State, Nigeria. The study adopted a quantitative pre-test-post-test, control group quasi-experimental design involving a 3x2 factorial matrix, with a positivist paradigm. Purposive sampling was used to select six schools across the LGAs while an intact class of upper secondary school II students was selected from each of the schools for a total of 305 participants. Two instruments, the Biology Attitude Questionnaire (BAQ) and the Students’ Verbal Ability Test (SVAT) were used during the study. The data generated were analysed using the Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA). Results showed that, treatments enhance students’ attitudes toward biology. Results also revealed that students’ verbal ability has effect on students’ attitudes toward biology. The interaction between treatment and verbal ability was not significant to enhance students’ attitudes toward biology. The two strategies, therefore, enhanced students’ attitude towards Biology in the two LGAs within Ibadan metropolis of Oyo State, Nigeria. The two strategies should therefore be adopted in teaching Biology to upper secondary school students in Nigeria and elsewhere. Keywords: attitude toward biology, consensus strategy, cooperative strategy, reflective journal writing, verbal ability

Globalization accelerates at an extreme rate through development of technologies of communication. However, people living in poor countries' access is very difficult because of the energy and financial demands that technology requires. One consequence of globalization for science and science education is it creates even more complex societies and challenges for indigenous communities. However, increasing local achievement in science and science education is advocated by a number of researchers in order to provide opportunities for people globally. This issue of making local knowledge part of the global brings with it the challenges of politics, history, language, economics, and ethics. The effects of globalization have been far-reaching, while the living standards of the world are still highly uneven. This study focused on ethno-science and globalization.

Education is changing rapidly. Schools are gradually shifting away from the traditional mode of instruction and toward a more active model of learning, in which students are collaborating on projects in small groups and then sharing their work with the class. Africa cannot afford to be left behind in this change. Though collaborative teaching and learning are quite popular in Africa, its variants/forms, consensus group and cooperative reflective journal writing are not. The effect of collaborative instructional strategies (consensus group and cooperative reflective journal writing) on students' achievement in biology as moderated by verbal ability was determined in this study. Three hundred five senior secondary school II students from two local governments' area within Ibadan Metropolis participated in the study. The Students' Biology Achievement Test (SBAT) and the Students' Verbal Ability Test (SVAT) were the main data collection tools used for this study. Data generated were analysed using Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA) and Bonferonni post hoc test. Results show that both forms of collaborative instructional strategies improved students' achievement in biology. Results showed that students exposed to the cooperative reflective journal writing achieved more in biology followed by students in the consensus group strategy. Collaborative strategy can be a feasible alternative approach to teaching biology as it fairly addresses issues of interaction in the classroom. This has helped students develop their communication and also improve their socialisation skills in the classroom and beyond.