Educational Development in Africa: Prospects and Challenges of Teaching/Learning History in Nigeria

Abstract

The paper discusses the challenges facing history teaching in Nigeria. The scope of the study is limited to private/public schools in Oyo State, Nigeria. The study starts by tracing the problem from the advent of missionaries to Nigeria in which their purpose of establishing mission schools was not to teach African history but to evangelize and to produce middlemen who will act as junior officers. The findings show that history as a subject was in the curriculum of both junior and senior secondary school. However, it was removed from junior secondary school curriculum and remained only in senior secondary school curriculum. Though only few senior secondary schools in Oyo State teach history subject due to lack of adequate knowledge by students in learning African history. Also, due to the reviewed policy, history teachers and textbooks are inadequate. Thus, in this present dispensation in Nigeria, African history education is facing challenges in terms of teaching and learning, apparently on the verge of extinction. The paper concludes by stating the methods of teaching history, prospects and challenges attached to it.