Prof. Ismail Junaidu, the Executive Secretary of the Nigerian Educational Research Development Council, has debunked the notion that outdated curriculum was responsible for students’ poor performance, particularly in Mathematics and English Language.
Junaidu debunked the assumption in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria on Tuesday in Abuja.
He said the Nigerian curriculum was rated the best in Africa by the International Bureau for Education.
Junaidu said: “Our curriculum is up-to-date; as a matter of fact and with all sense of responsibility, the IBE judged our curriculum the best in the African region.
“We have the best up-to-date curriculum in the region.”
According to him, the major problem in Nigeria is implementation. There are bright ideas but execution and implementation is where we have problems, Junaidu said.
He said that getting the states to train the teachers into effecting the curriculum was a problem.
Junaidu said: “The council was able to train 40 teachers from each state in the federation on how to implement the curriculum effectively, in the hope that they would train the other teachers.
“But that was not done.”
The professor said that other factors such as teachers, students and parents’ apathy was also responsible for poor performance in schools.
Junaidu said that many teachers were being owed salary for many months, which may have resulted in them no longer going to teach.
He said that many teachers were not qualified, noting that you cannot give what you do not have.
Junaidu said: “Is learning taking place in our primary schools, because teachers are not paid and how do you expect that teacher to go and teach?
“There are so many factors responsible for failure in Mathematics and English Language, and to me, curriculum is not the issue.”
Junaidu said that some students would rather browse the Internet than read their books.
He, however, expressed hope that with the present administration’s change agenda, things would change for the best.
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