Lights

Nigeria became an independent country on October 1, 1960, and a full Republic in 1963. As a young, nation, it became necessary to determine what curriculum should be designed for schools in order to accelerate her growth and development as a nation. In order to achieve this objective, a team of curriculum experts was invited from Harvard University in the United States of America. (USA), to examine Nigeria’s educational system and school curriculum that were then in use and make appropriate recommendations. The findings of the experts were as follows:

1. The missionaries who introduced formal education the first place, neither followed nor use any written curriculum plan, nor had an educational policy to guide proper curriculum planning. Each school operated independently in accordance with its own specific needs.

2. The prescribed leaning activities were old-fashioned and meant to serve the interests of the colonialists. The Educational objectives and orientation were not applicable to the Nigerian context.

3. As a pluralistic society, there are peculiar problems in each section of the country. For example, what was considered important by a group could be irrelevant in another culture? Besides, the Nigerian Arts and Culture, and Nigerian Languages were neglected.

4. There were irregularities in the time of opening and closing of the school sessions.

5. School learning tends to concentrate on mental processes (or cognitive skills) to the detriment of other processes.

6. There is much emphasis on rote learning and passing of terminal examinations.

So you would have seen from the foregoing that immediately after independence, Nigeria as a nation had taken up the challenge of nationhood by trying to determine what was best for her citizens. They found the answer in education, and knew that an appropriate curriculum that would meet the needs and aspirations of her citizens should be designed and implemented. These teams from the USA were invited as external experts who could make appropriate recommendations. Thus, a change of the curriculum in Nigerian schools was imminent. As you would understand later on in subsequent units, curriculum plans are usually reviewed from time to time, or as the need arises. Curriculum change is always an on-going process. Curriculum development is therefore NOT static, but dynamic in nature. This point will further be expatiated upon in subsequent units, but suffice to say for now that these experts made very useful recommendations which, resulted in the new curriculum in which, for example, subject such as Geography and African History were introduced as part of the curriculum. French Language replaced Latin, and British History, which was a major subject, gave way to African/Nigerian History. The then, Nigerian Educational Research Council (NERC) (now known as Nigerian Educational Research and Development Council (NERDC), as well as Comparative and Scientific Adaptation Centre (CESAC), were assigned the responsibility of implementing the recommendations of the US experts from Harvard University.

In spite of these changes, and because of the upsurge of interest and global growth and development in Technology, Nigerian’s educational planners did not rest as there was yet another call to revise the curriculum. The response to this call resulted in the National curriculum Conference held in 1969, out of which has grown a more acceptable National Policy on Education first published in 1977, and is being revised form time to time since then. It was this document that brought about the educational system now referred to as the 6-3-3-4 system.

Details of this Conference and how the Policy was being implemented would be discussed in a subsequent unit on Curriculum Planning and Implementation Strategies.

Self Assessment Questions

1. Who and what determined what was to be taught in “schools” during the pre-colonial era in Nigeria?

2. Mention some of the important features of the curriculum during the pre-colonial period.

3. Name or list at least 3 areas in which pre-colonial curriculum development is different from the curriculum during the colonial period.

4. Immediately after Independence, Nigerians felt the need to change the inherited curriculum from the colonialists. List at least 3 areas of dissatisfaction with the curriculum designed by the colonialists, which necessitated the need for change.

4.0 CONCLUSION

Tracing the history of curriculum development in Nigeria as can be seen already is an important exercise worth doing. You must have seen that a nation that needs to develop as fast as other nations are developing need to design an appropriate curriculum which will meet her own needs.

The history of curriculum development in Nigeria is an important subject to study as it shows that society learns from the mistakes of the past and takes cognizance of the experience while planning new course of action.

By studying the history, you would have seen that curriculum development is an ongoing exercise as there are always needs for review from time to time. This is important point to note by curriculum developers as well as students of curriculum design. The following is a summary of what has been learnt, specifically, in this unit.

5.0 SUMMARY

In this unit, you have learnt the following major facts:

i) That history could be written about various developments in a subject area, e.g in Medicine, in Law and of course in Curriculum Development

ii) That studying the history of curriculum development is important as it help curriculum planners to make appropriate changes as the need arises;

iii) that new materials can be produced and methodologies can change, in accordance with the growing trend in curriculum development;

iv) that curriculum development during the pre-colonial era depended largely on the needs of the different communities and there were no uniform objectives. The “subjects” were also learnt through observation and doing, as there were no formal schools;

v) that the curriculum design in use during the colonial period served the need, first of Christian Missionary Evangelists, and the Colonial Government. Although there were formal schools, the subjects taught only encouraged rote learning and did not emphasize science subjects;

vi) that there were clamouring for changes in the immediate post colonial era. This clamour resulted in the invitation of experts from Harvard University, United States of America, (USA) who highlighted many of the shortcomings of the curriculum inherited from the colonialists and colonial periods have been the communities and the British respectively.

But during the post-colonial era not only Government but also professionals and the average citizen were the stakeholders, who were interested in what went on in the schools.