Abstract: The study assessed the influence of extracurricular activities on pre-primary children’s physical development. It intended to identify kinds of extracurricular activities and examine their benefits to children’s physical development. The study employed a mixed research approach with a descriptive design and a sample of 65 respondents. The study employed the Child’s Development Theory. The study collected data through semi-structured interviews with heads of schools and closed-ended questionnaires with sports teachers and pre-primary teachers. The researcher ran IBM SPSS statistics version 27.1 to compute the collected data. The researcher analyzed data through content analysis and descriptive statistics. The findings revealed that sports are among the famous and everyday extracurricular activities widely used in pre-primary schools. Also, the findings revealed that the benefits of extracurricular activities depend on the length of practice. These benefits include more muscular muscle development, healthy growth of bones, improved coordination balance, and greater ability for physical relaxation. The study recommends that school administrators employ more physical activities to enhance preschool learners’ physical development.

Abstract: The purpose of this study was to assess the extent to which extracurricular activities contribute to student retention in public secondary schools. The study employed a mixed research approach, and a convergent parallel design. Closed and open-ended questionnaires, semi-structured interview guide and non-participatory observation method were used for data collection. Stratified and simple random sampling techniques were utilized in securing a sample of 116 respondents who were involved in the study as source of data. These included 100 students, 5 Heads of school, 5 sports and games teachers, 5 discipline teachers from five public secondary schools in Bariadi district council, including one District Secondary Education Officer. Quantitative data were analyzed through the help of SPSS version 21, while qualitative data were analyzed thematically. The findings indicate that student participation in extracurricular activities like sports and games, scouts, social clubs as well as student leadership, make them get more engaged, enjoy school life and persevere in their studies. The study also established that extracurricular activities are excellent means of motivating students, which is crucial to their retention. The study recommends governmental and non -governmental leaders to invest more on constructing facilities in schools which can be used for extracurricular activities which promote students’ socialization and sense of belonging which in the long term promotes student retention. To avoid being too monotonous in extracurricular activities, school leaders and teachers should endeavor to be more innovative in introducing a variety of activities which are more attractive and engaging to students.