A Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Award of the Degree of "Licencié en Pédagogie Appliquée, Agrégé dé l'Enseignement Secondaire en Anglais"

RESERVE,

This study is about a comparative study of factors contributing to success or failure in First Form Arts National tests of English.I focused on problems encountered by pupils from day-schools (communal High school) First form Arts in the state examinations of English ,by comparing them to those met by students in boarding-scgools at the same level.Once the problem was identified,I suggested various strategies which may be helpful to overcome these problems that the learners from day-schools encounter during the learning process at school.This study was carried out with 116 respondents,that is,110 pupils of First form Arts Section and 6 teachers of selected schools in Ruyigi province that have an Arts section with three classes having taken the National tests.The questions on this study were grouped in three main themes which are:qualification and motivation of tearchers,materials and living conditions.As instruments used to collect data needed for this study,the research questions:"Do the qualification and motivation of teachers influence success in English National tests in First form Arts?Does the availability of materials influence failure at the English National Tests in First Form Arts? Do the learners'living conditions influence success in English National Test?" were used in this study.As far as findings are concerned,this study revealed that:"pupils from day-schools have some difficulties in performing well in the English language learning process.First of all their materials are not sufficient,their living conditions do not permit them to study in a good atmosphere.After collecting the data i concluded that students from day schools are victims of the problem stated above and consequently fail more than their fellows in boarding schools.According to teachers from day-schools they admitted that they have the problem of lack of adequate materials.But some of them said that they try to barrow some lacking materials from neighboring boarding schools.The remedy proposed by both teachers and pupils is the creation of english clubs in schools and participating in them.This study concluded by giving recommendations to teachers,learners,school administrators,the Ministry of education and future researchers.