Fostering the Teaching of English Language in Nigeria Primary Schools: the Need for Teachers’ Continuous Professional Development and Training

Abstract

This article highlights how English language teachers professional development and training programmes fosters teachers’ professional competences in the teaching of the subject. English Language is vital in developing communication and social skills in learners as it does empower learners to compete favorably with their peers around the world. The ex-post factor approach of the survey design was adopted in the study. A random sampling technique was used to select twenty primary schools in Oyo state, Nigeria, with 168 English teachers who were currently undergoing the SUBEB/UBEC teacher professional development programme (2018). Two instruments: Teacher Teaching Competence Scale (TTCS) with Cronbach’s Alpha reliability coefficient of 0.68 and the Teachers Checklist Observation Scale (TCOS) with Scott Pi reliability coefficient of 0.71 were used for data collection. The data collection lasted for a period of fourteen weeks. Data collected were analysed using descriptive statistics and correlation at 0.05 level of significance. Results revealed that teacher’ attendance and exposure to a professional development and training programme; does enhance their professional teaching competences. It is therefore expedient that stakeholders in the education sector; especially governmental agencies, sponsor and encourage practicing primary teachers in attending and participating in professional development programmes; incentives should also be given to these teachers. This will go a long way at ensuring that these teachers look forward to attending such programmes at any time in the future