 |
Asia-Pacific Forum on Science Learning and Teaching, Volume 8, Issue 1, Article
4 (June, 2007) Nwachukwu Prince OLOLUBE The relationship between funding, ICT, selection processes, administration and planning and the standard of science teacher education in Nigeria |
The purpose of this section is to examine the research studies that investigated the nature and problems of teacher education, and to examine the implication for the development of education for sustainable development. This review does not, however, cover a wide range of areas. The primary intention here is to examine the range of activities that hinder effective teacher education practices in Nigeria and to discuss pertinent prospects at the end of the paper.
Teaching is a diverse and complex activity. As infants progress from childhood through adolescence into adulthood, they are taught by their parents, teachers and other adults, not to mention peers and the media. Clearly, the teaching they experience along the way varies greatly: teaching a toddler to walk is very different from teaching the fundamentals of differentials of calculus. Yet even when there is a common goal it can be pursued in different ways. Consider the development of civic responsibility for example: home, school and various community organizations pursue similar objectives but the teaching methods employed to generate the requisite knowledge and behaviors are very different. The point of these examples is to demonstrate that teaching is multi-dimensional and is not susceptible to simple-minded analysis or prescription—neither of which, sad to say, is in short supply. Effective teaching draws on a multiplicity of cognitive, affective and interpersonal elements. To appreciate fully the challenges of teaching excellence, we have to bear in mind not only the extraordinary diversities of these elements but also the many different ways that effective teaching can draw on them to construct effective teaching behavior (Hegarty, 2000).
Thus, it is predicted that effective teaching is an intelligent, knowledge-based activity that takes proper account of teachers’ professionalism. This understanding stems from the condition that teaching education and training are an embodiment of professional development. Through teacher education and preparation, pre-service teachers learn through rigorous professional development courses in education. Here they learn concepts in their subject areas and also learn strategies for teaching those subjects. They have the opportunity to practice some of the skills required for teaching during micro-teaching and peer-teaching. There, they learn to develop assessment portfolios for themselves and gain insight into how their progress will be monitored when they are out during internship (teaching practice proper) (Amedeker, 2005; Eze, 2001).
Intending teachers and teachers need help either through pre-service or in-service teacher education programs to develop their content knowledge, their pedagogical skills or the realization of certain practices. Shulman’s (1987) introduction of the term pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) captured that the combination of pedagogical content knowledge and pedagogical skills are a necessary prerequisite of the organization of teaching and learning activities. According to Shulman, pedagogical content knowledge has to do with the teacher’s ideas regarding what it is to be an effective teacher and how one goes about teaching effectively. Since the introduction of PCK, the use of PCK as a concept has gained ground in educational research.
The dimensions of teacher education and preparation of teachers include the nature and extent of guidance given to them. Their success in teaching depends on their knowledge, attitude toward teaching, academic self-concept and explicit understanding of the profession. Teacher education and preparation, therefore, provide teachers with knowledge, skills and aptitude to be familiar with the art and science of teaching that in turn gives them confidence to carry out their task. In the same vein, the purpose, relevance, degree of structure, methods of teaching and management of teaching provide success for classroom practices (Amedeker, 2005). According to Yusuf (2002), the main objectives of teacher education are to develop awareness, knowledge, attitudes, skills, evaluation ability and full participation in the teaching and learning process.
Education funds refer to budgetary allocations that are readily available or that are going to be made available at a stated time by governments or institutions for the purpose of paying salaries, allowances and benefits, and the building and provision of educational infrastructures to aid teaching and learning. Education funding in Nigeria has gradually been on the rise culminating in an eleven per cent allocation in the year 2006 budget. Nigeria has struggled to meet the 26 per cent allocation recommended by UNESCO as a means of attaining quality education and education for sustainable development 2005-2014. Despite improved budgetary allocation to the education sector in Nigeria, the condition of the sector remains worrisome. Conditions of facilities are still a far cry from acceptable basically due to past under-funding and systemic corruption. Education is an essential service that must be scrutinized, monitored and constantly evaluated and fully exorcised from the grip of corruption if we are ever going to attain the education for all (EFA) goals. This realization has elicited stringent calls for effective utilization of funds to solve the myriad of problems in the education sector. The impact of corruption is pervasive both in terms of the drain on national resources and its corrosive influence on institutional efficiency and service delivery in all sectors including teacher education (Samuel, 2006).
In spite of the federal government specification in the National Policy on education that “teacher education will continue to be given a major emphasis in all our education planning because no education system can rise above the quality of its teachers” (Federal Government of Nigeria, 1989), education has continued to be grossly under funded. Inadequate finance from both federal and state governments militates against the progress of the Colleges of Education and teacher education generally, and this indicates that professionalism is a very remote possibility (Lawal, 2003). Equally, according to Odenigbo (n.d), financing educational ventures in Nigeria especially since the newly created states, has been very poor, to say nothing of training the Teachers (Tutors / Teachers) at all levels of education.
The unsatisfactory funding for teacher education programs stands as one of the major factors working against effective implementation of the programs. The consequences of the under-funding of this sector are immediate; for example, it results in the inability to purchase instructional materials to effectively prepare pre-service teachers like computers, text books, laboratory equipment, audio visual aids, slides, video clips, electronic white boards, electronic conferencing materials, enough chairs and desks in classrooms to keep students from having to stand to receive lectures to mention a few. The dilapidation that characterizes Nigerian schools is very serious (Ololube, 2006a).
Recently the integration of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in university teaching and particularly in teacher training has been the topic of much debate (Larose, et al. 1999). As educational systems around the world are under increased pressure to use the new information and communication technologies (ICTs) to teach students knowledge and skills they need in the 21st century, teacher education institutions are faced with the challenges of preparing a new generation of teachers to effectively use the new learning tools in their teaching practices (UNESCO, 2002). As a result, teacher education has not been unaffected by the penetrating influence of information and communication technology (ICT). ICTs’ advances have provided a rich global resource and collaborative environment for dissemination of ICT literacy materials, interactive discussions, research information, and international exchange of ideas which are critical for advancing meaningful educational initiatives, training a high skilled labor force, and understanding issues related to economic development.
Certainly, ICT has impacted the quality and quantity of teaching, learning, and research in traditional distance education institutions around the world (Ifinedo & Uwadia, 2005; Ifinedo & Ololube, 2007). In concrete terms, ICT has enhanced teaching and learning through its dynamic, interactive, and engaging content; it has provided real opportunities for individualized instruction. Information and communication technology has the potential to accelerate, enrich, and deepen skills; motivate and engage students in learning; help to relate school experiences to work practices; help to create economic viability for tomorrow’s workers; contribute to radical changes in school; strengthen teaching, and provide opportunities for connection between the school and the world. Information communication technology can make the school more efficient and productive, thereby engendering a variety of tools to enhance and facilitate teachers’ professional activities (Yusuf, 2005).
Nigeria as a nation, however, came late and has progressed slowly in the use of ICT in all sectors of the nation’s existence especially in teacher education. This is a result of chronic limitations brought about by economic disadvantages and government policies. These factors have direct consequences on the nation’s educational development. Fundamentally, the slow access to basic ICT equipment, low internet connectivity and lack of computers, and inadequacy in the use of audiovisual materials and equipment including films, slides, transparencies, projectors, globes, charts, maps, bulletin boards, plus programmed materials, information retrieval systems, and instructional television in teacher education programs are barriers to the effective and professional development of teachers in Nigeria (Ololube, 2006).
Thus, teacher education and training are a means for professional updating which deals with all developmental functions directed at the maintenance and enhancement of one’s professional competence. Teachers’ professional growth supports the idea that ICT in teacher education and training is an important factor in job effectiveness and development. This is so because teachers’ education and training are generally considered to be essential for school effectiveness and improvement (Larose, et al. 1999). It was further argued that teachers who are bent on improving their competence are likely to contribute directly or indirectly to the growth of student achievement. Equally, Javis (1983), Keen (1991), Creemers (1994) and Kautto-Koivula’s (1997) studies concerning their experience in staff training and education clearly demonstrated the need to offer teachers better opportunities to educate and develop themselves in order to create understanding between their job and their effectiveness.
Administration and Planning Process
A very remarkable problem that has inhibited effective teacher education programs over the years in Nigeria is the lack of effective administration and planning because the success of any educational system is hinged on proper planning, efficient administration and adequate financing (Mgbodile, 2001). This problem is not peculiar to developing countries; educational institutions in developed countries still compete for public funds with other sectors of the economy so that they can improve the quality of the resources available for teaching and learning. When made available, the resources are to be put into maximum use so that educational objectives can be achieved (Whawo, 1993). Educational administration and planning and manpower training and development have evolved as a discipline to guide the allocation and utilization of educational resources both human and material in the school system. This is required to arrest areas of wasted resources to make educational production more effective. In this regard, educational administration, planning, and manpower training and development have become indispensable tools in the management of activities in all spheres of life (Ololube, 2004).
Educational administration here includes essentially a service, activity or tool through which the fundamental objectives of the educational process may be more fully and efficiently realized. It is the activities of educational organization as geared towards the attainment of goals of teaching on the part of teachers and learning on the part of learners (Aderounmu & Ehiametalor, 1985; Peretomode, 1991). Administration includes organization and structure, proprietorship and control, inspection and supervision. These functions may be discharged efficiently with a cadre of staff that is adequate in numbers and quality.
The planning process (analysis, formulation, implementation and control) is the plan itself. A plan is a blueprint for action; it prescribes the necessary activities for the education industry to realize its goals. Therefore the purpose of planning is simply to ensure that the educational industry is effective in its activities. In a broader sense, an educational system must develop a plan that ensures that the appropriate products and services are offered to its students. More specifically, planning gives guidance and direction to members of an organization as to the role in delivering its products and services. Such a scheme of arrangement is to be made beforehand by preparing a purposed method of achieving the desired objectives (Whawo, 1993).
Strategic planning process is the critical stage in the history of teacher education in Africa. The first stage of strategic planning process, which involves evaluating the present situation of African countries’ teacher education programs, is poor, because it requires a thorough evaluation of the internal operation of the education system. The purpose of internal analysis is to identify the educational system assets, skills, and resources that represent its strengths, weaknesses, obstacles and challenges thus identifying strategic alternatives as well as evaluating and choosing the strategy that provides the optimum performance of the teacher education program. Implementation has been inconsistent and in most cases, statistical deficiencies as well as inadequate skilled personnel inhibits the planning process. The monitoring of the implementation process to ensure that it is in line with the expected performance has been insufficient (Ololube, 2006b).
Hence, the rising outcry for educational accountability is a universal issue that necessitates planning. Educational institutions must account for resources invested in them by the society in terms of how provided resources have been utilized to meet educational goals and objectives. This is a logical philosophy which underlines the process of feedback in the education process. Accountability in the school system examines the efficiency and effectiveness of education production. Educational administration and planning coordinate the activities of the school system toward goal realization. Experts (e.g., Aderounmu & Ehiametalor, 1985; Enaohwo & Eferakeya, 1989; Whawo, 1993) agree that factors such as unplanned activities that are random, dysfunctional and not directed towards the accomplishments of organizational objectives have been partially responsible for the ineffectiveness of schools. The enthronement of mediocrity in all spheres of life in Africa is a byproduct of these factors. That is, many African educational systems have endlessly failed to prepare their youth for successful and industrious living and involvement in national development (Foster, 1999). Likewise Niemi (1996) noted that for any educational system to develop, effective teacher education and educational administration and planning are necessary as education and planning are indispensable characteristics for teacher empowerment and the changing of their status in the society. Figure 2 illustrates the basic elements for the achievement of educational goals. This involves the acquisition of skills-accountability-commitment.
Figure 2 . A Mini Model of Basic Elements for Goal Achievement
Selection of candidates into various teacher education programs is based on those candidates meeting their entrance requirements. Entrance requirements are arbitrary; they vary from state to state and from college to college. The success of a candidate depends on the entrance examination statement of results without consideration of a purposeful interview. However, students put in applications for admission without a sincere commitment to teach in future. Some, after the completion of their course work never contemplate remaining in the profession while others eventually desert teaching for “better” alternative jobs (Lawal, 2003).
The admission policies of various Colleges of Education in Nigeria are uneven and the case is even more uncertain in the universities despite the specification by the Nigerian University Commission (NUC) (Ololube, 2004). Nevertheless, the poorest students in terms of academic achievements seem to be most suitable for absorption into the teaching profession. Let us not forget that the same way the engineer needs long years of training to understand the complex equations and their mechanical relations, medical doctors require long years of study to appreciate the intricacies of human anatomy and lawyers also need to be imbued with a good knowledge of legal maneuvers and court room intrigues, this is how teachers need to acquire a vast repertoire of knowledge of the principles, methods and processes of education, which is as eclectic as all the previously mentioned professions (Ololube, 2006b).
A cursory evaluation of the admission requirements of the various institutions of higher learning reflect the values of the educational system. One finds that the best minds are admitted into the natural and physical science programs while the next category of applicants are absorbed into the social, management or environmental sciences, the liberal arts and the humanities. The third category, those on the lowest rung of the ladder in terms of intellectual attainment, are pushed to the faculties of education or schools of education ostensibly to mark time while they are squeezed to the more ‘prestigious’ faculty the following academic year. The advents of poorly trained, unqualified and ill-motivated teachers in the Nigerian educational system have had far reaching effects on its national development as there is no way a brilliant child will go into the teaching profession that has brought so much pain and sadness to its employees. When the best products of the school system are not encouraged to enter into such a noble profession, the platform is made ready for the mischief makers to take over because the faculty or school accepts waivers for students in order to fill its quotas (Nigerian Tribune, January 11, 2004).
A survey conducted (Ololube, 1991) to ascertain the factors that are responsible for the choice of career among secondary school students in Nigeria revealed how society has carefully stigmatized members of the teaching profession resulting in a majority of students contemplating professions like engineering, law, medicine, accounting, banking etc. The study found very few children who are interested in becoming teachers (see also, Okwubunka, 1994).
The decline in the quality of education in Nigeria has become too glaring within the past 20 years to be glossed over by anybody who is aware of education’s key role as an instrument of social transformation and development in society (Iyamu, 2005). The over direction of student teachers by colleges and university lecturers which results in the lack of proper imagination and initiative on the part of most student teachers, makes them depend on lecturer’s notes, handouts, and examination materials thereby leading to the production of low quality teachers (Lawal, 2003).
Tertiary institutions that provide teacher education programs are in crisis. Most lecturers are now either contractors, that is, supplying goods and services to schools or engage in commercial business within and outside the school at the detriment of the academic calling and purpose. For example, some lecturers have turned their offices into commercial centers either doing typesetting services or engaging in buying and selling petty goods. Some have turned to selling cars; that is helping people to bring cars across the border and ferry them into the country. Some of them argue that they have had to resort to this “moonlighting” to augment their salaries which are meager and not regular. The tertiary institutions that are established to promote intellectual excellence, good virtues etc. have deviated from their traditional obligations of teaching, research and development of manpower. We are faced daily with reports of students caught in armed robbery, rape, assassination etc. A majority of these institutions have misplaced their goals and allowed social and political factors to create crises in their academic community. It is a known fact that tertiary institutions do not get their entire approved annual budget (Olujuwon, 2003). Thus, researchers and commentators persistently argue that Nigerian public schools are experiencing dwindling standards in the quality of education received as a result of poor quality teacher education programs.
The inability of most Nigerian secondary school and university graduates to communicate effectively in written and spoken English is an obvious sign of the waning quality of education. Umoh (2006) described the situation “Although I am not an English language master, but one thing that baffled me in hearing these kinds of uncommon gaffes in English grammar from people who had passed one examination or the other in institutions of higher learning, or is this the kind of language the lecturers right from the secondary school to the higher institution normally use to teach and set examination for them? And which language have they been using to answer questions and pass to qualify them to be employed as senior staff by multinationals?”
This is apparent in Okeowo’s (2006) argument in which he warned that the low quality of teaching in public schools might hinder the development of the country if not tackled swiftly. According to Okeowo, the phenomenon of mediocre teaching in our public schools is staging an obvious sabotage and coup against further growth of democratization of education. He noted that the poor quality of teachers and their teaching had contributed to the high level of failure in public examinations, and it is a major problem in the country’s educational sector, adding that the drop out rate in schools had also increased. Okeowo stressed that regular, efficient and effective teaching builds a nation while irregular, minimal, zero and incompetent teaching can destroy that same nation. Consequently, Umoh (2006), Malik (1997), Disu (1996), and Urevbu (1997) made it obvious that the poor performances of students in the Senior School Certificate Examination (SSCE) is an indication that the nation’s education system is actually falling. They attributed it to several factors ranging from examination problems, lecturer factors, the increased role of authorities within the system, and, most importantly, poor teacher preparatory programs.
