DEVELOPMENT OF TEACHER EDUCATION IN NIGERIA

This synopsis of the development of
teacher education in Nigeria emphasizes the
relative roles of the Christian missions and
the colonial administration. The
recommendation of two commissions
(Phelps stokes and Ashby) and their
implications to the development of teacher
education in colonial Nigeria are also
discussed. The paper assesses the available
teacher training institutions in the country
as at 1999 and recommends that more
should be provided in the country to solve
the acute shortage of teachers in the sector
while teachers should reciprocate the recent
upward review of wages and salaries by
being more dedicated, devoted and
committed to their jobs.
INTRODUCTION
The success of an educational
enterprise particularly in terms of quality
depends to a large extent, on the regular
supply of teachers in adequate quantity and
quality. In the National Policy on
Education, the Federal Republic of Nigeria
(1981) also asserts that no nation can
achieve economic, social and technological
progress and self-sufficiency without a good
system of education to sustain its
achievement. The training and production
of the manpower required for the
attainment of national objectives should be
framed on the quality and quantity of
teachers.
Fafunwa (1974) stressed the
dependency of manpower training and
development on teachers. He argues that
teacher education should be basically
related to every phase of development in
Nigeria, for wherever one turns, be it
economic, political or social spheres of
activities, one is faced with the over-
reoccurring problem of trained manpower
needs but no adequate training can take
place without competent teachers to handle
the programme.
THE MISSIONARIES EFFORTS IN THE
DEVELOPMENT OF EDUCATION IN
NIGERIA
The origin and development of
teacher education can be traced to the
beginning of western education in the
country, the various church Missions such
as the Wesleyan Methodist, the Church
Missionary Society, the Baptist, the Church
of Scotland (Presbyterian) and the Roman
Catholic were very active in Nigeria
between 1842 and 1860. They contributed in
no small measure to the development of
teacher education. According to Ajayi
(1965),the missionaries devoted their
attention initially to the development of
elementary (primary) education in the
country. According to him, this might be
due to the little stipend the missions
relied upon from their overseas
headquarters. Adeyinka (1971) remarks
that the missionaries trained their teachers
through the pupil-teacher system. In such a
setting, the missionary teacher kept the
school in his premises and his pupils lived
with him as part of his family. Fajana
(1978) added that those pupils whose ages
were about 14 years had to have passed the
standard V examination. They were then
recruited as teachers to receive one hour
daily instruction from the head teacher on
how to teach. The duration of the course
was two years after which they would sit
for the pupil-teacher examination.
The first teacher training college,
known as The Training Institution was
established in Abeokuta in 1859 by the
Church Missionary Society (CMS). The
school was later moved to Lagos in 1896
when the missionaries were expelled from
Abeokuta. It later moved to Oyo to
become the St. Andrews College, Oyo. In
1897, the Baptist Mission established the
Baptist Training College at Ogbomoso. In
1905 the Wesleyan Methodist Missionary
Society founded an institution for the
training of catechists and teachers in
Ibadan. It opened with four pupils. The
number of pupils had risen to twenty
by 1918 and the institution became
known as the Wesleyan College,
Ibadan. As the Missionaries were
making frantic efforts to provide
teacher training institutions in the
Western part of the country, so also were
they trying to provide informal training
for the teachers in the East. According to
Fafunwa (1974), under the apprenticeship
system, homeless boys and children of
converted village heads lived with the
missionaries and were taught to become
pupil teachers and catechists. This practice
of using apprenticeship system to train
teachers was very common in the Western
part of the country before and after the
establishment of teacher training
institution.
The training of teachers in the
northern part of Nigeria started with the
opening of the Nassarawa School by the
British government in 1909. The pre-
requisite qualification for admission into a
teacher training institution was standard
IV. Apart from having Standard IV
Certificate, the candidate, according to
Fafunwa (1974), must have served as a
pupil-teacher for two years and must have
passed the pupil-teacher's certificate
examination and would then have to act as
assistant teacher before starting the two-
year training course. At the end of the two
years, the candidate would sit for and pass
a prescribed teachers certificate
examination and would be certified if he
passed the examination.
THE PHELP-STOKES REPORT AND ITS
IMPLICATION ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF
TEACHER EDUCATION IN NIGERIA
There was a severe criticism of the
teacher training system of the missions by
the Phelp-Stokes report of 1925. According
to the report, the teacher training system
was unsatisfactory, the pupil-teacher was
over-worked and under-paid; the
curriculum was poorly conceived. The
supervisory system, according to Fafunwa
(1974), was inadequate. The missions did
not understand the purpose of African
education. In order to re-orientate and re-
organise the teacher education system along
the lines suggested by the Phelp-Stokes
report to
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teacher education in
Nigeria
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West Africa Journal of Educational
Research 3(1
redress the inadequacy of teacher education
in the country, two types of teacher-
training institutions were evolved.
1. The Elementary Training College (ETC) for
lower primary school teachers ; and
2. The Higher Elementary
Training College (H.E.T.C).
The Elementary Training College (ETC)
course lasted for two years and culminated
in the award of Grade III Teacher’s
Certificate, while the H.E.T.C. course also
lasted for two years and led to the Grade II
Teacher's Certificate. Any candidate willing
to go for the E.T.C course would have
served as a pupil teacher for two years and
on the successful completion of the Grade II
course had to teach again for at least two
years before proceeding to the Higher
Elementary Training College for the two-
year Grade II course.
THE ASHBY COMMISSION'S REPORT AND
ITS IMPLICATION ON THE DEVELOPMENT
ON TEACHER EDUCATION IN NIGERIA.
Before the Ashby Commission’s
report, there was nothing like B.A (Ed.) or
B.Sc. (Ed.) or B.Ed, in Nigeria. The few
graduates were graduates in Arts or Science
(with B.A or B.Sc. degrees). Some of them
had also the Post-Graduate Diploma in
Education (P.G.D.E.) of the University of
London (Fafunwa 1974).
One major event in the development of
teacher education in Nigeria was the
publication and subsequent implementation
of the Ashby Commission report. While
summarizing the facilities for post
secondary education in Nigeria, the Ashby
Commission observed that there was a
“gravely inadequate supply of trained and
educated teachers” in Nigeria Secondary
Grammar Schools, even when there was an
increase in demand for more of this
category of education institutions.
With reference to teacher-
education, the most relevant
recommendations     of the Ashby
Commission were:
a) The opening of more universities
b) The institution of a Bachelor’s Degree in
Education, i.e. B.A. (Ed.), B.Sc. (Ed.), or
B.Ed.
c) The training of more .teachers for the
nation’s secondary schools.
The decade following the attainment of
independence by Nigeria was one of rapid
expansion of teacher education facilities.
The decade ended with the production of
another educational document namely, the
report of the National Curriculum
Conference of 1969(Taiwo, 1986). This
document spelt out the objectives and
contents of all levels of education, including
teacher education in Nigeria. The 1969
Curriculum Conference provided the basis
for the National Policy on Education of the
Federal Republic of Nigeria (1977) revised
in 1981.
The National Policy on Education
opened a new page in the development of
teacher training programmes in Nigeria.
Adeyinka (1993) observed that with the
introduction of the 6-3-3-4 education
system, there was the need for a new
orientation of
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teacher education in
Nigeria
WAJER 3 (1), 129-133
West Africa Journal of Educational
Research 3(1
secondary teachers and students. He stated
further that the students were faced with a
new curriculum challenge, that of
acquiring the basic knowledge, and for the
teachers, the skill to teach the new
curriculum.
National Policy on Education also
states that all teachers in the nation's
educational institutions, from pre-primary
to university, would be professionally
trained. The implication of this is that more
Grade II Teachers’ colleges and more
tertiary institutions would be established
for the training of these teachers. This is
what happened in the years following 1977
with considerable emphasis on the opening
of tertiary institutions for the training of
secondary school teachers in order to
ensure that teacher education objectives are
realized.
Adeyinka (1988) stated that certain
categories of educational institutions are
charged with the responsibility of giving the
required professional 'training for teachers
these are?
i) Grade II Teacher's Colleges,
ii) Advanced Teacher's Colleges,
iii) Colleges of Education
iv) Institutes of Education
v) National Teachers' Institute
Prior to this and in preparation for
the U.P.E scheme, the Federal Government
had approved emergency teacher training
programmes which began in September,
1974. This, according to Adeyinka (1988),
was meant to produce 163,000 additional
teachers estimated for the scheme. To
obtain this large number of teacher
trainees, the government mounted four
different teacher education programmes for
four different categories of school leavers.
These were:
i) One-year course for holders of the West
African School Certificate.
ii) Two-year course for those who
attempted WASC and failed or those
with Grade III Teacher's Certificate.
iii) Three-year course for holders of Modern
III Certificate or S-75 Certificate i.e.
recognized Secondary Class IV Certificate.
iv) Five-year course of holders of Primary
School Certificate.
In 1957, the University of Ibadan
introduced a one-year course for graduates
leading to a diploma of education.
In1961,the University started a one-year
Associate ship course for selected Grade II
teachers who would take over the headship
of primary schools after the successful
completion of their studies. (Fafunwa,
1974). The Ashby Commission's
recommendation for Teacher's Grade I
colleges was modified to give rise to new
programme and a new certificate - the
Nigerian Certificate in Education (NCE). This
programme was meant for the training and
preparation of teachers for the lower forms
of secondary schools, and the teacher
training colleges. The schools were
popularly called the "Advanced teachers'
colleges". They were established at Lagos
1962, Ibadan (1962) but transferred to Ondo
where it became the Adeyemi College of
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WAJER 3 (1), 129-133
West Africa Journal of Educational
Research 3(1
Education). Owerri 1963, Zaria 1962, Kano
1964 and Abraka 1968) (Taiwo, 1986).
Admission to these advanced teacher’s
colleges was open to candidates who held
either the Teachers' Grade 11 Certificate and
passed in two subjects at the ordinary level
of the General Certificate of Education
(GCE), or the West African School
Certificate with Credit in at least two
subjects, or the G.C.E. (O level) in five
subjects including English Language. To
achieve N.C.E, according to Taiwo (1986), a
candidate must pass a final examination in
two science or two arts subjects, education
and practical teaching, and must have
passed in ancillary subjects like general
English, Library work, Health and
physical education, offered during the
programme:
The Ashby Commission also
recommended teacher education programme
at the university level, observing that the
new crop of Grade I teachers popularly
referred to as "well-qualified non-graduate
teachers" should be trained to man the
lower levels of secondary schools and
teacher-training colleges. The commission
therefore recommended the introduction of
a Bachelor of Arts/Science degree in
Education (B.A. (Ed.)/B.Sc, (Ed.) in all
Nigerian universities
The B.A and B.Sc (Ed.) according to
Fafunwa (1974) was launched at the
University of Nigeria, Nsukka in September
1961 with 50 students.
The University of Ibadan followed in
1963, Ahmadu Bello  University in 1964, the
University of Lagos in 1965 and the
University of Ife (now Obafemi Awolowo
University) Ile-Ife, in 1967.
CONCLUSION
With the efforts of the British government
in starting the establishment of teacher
training institutions in the country and
with the bold steps taken by the Nigerian
Government and private organizations to
continue in the development of these
institutions, the country can now boast of
20 Federal Colleges of Education made up of
11 for regular programmes, eight(8) for
technical programmes and  one
(1 ) running special programmes.    There
are also 38 State Colleges of Education, 12
Polytechnics running education
programmes, and three(3) Colleges of
Education  run by private organisations
(PCE Brochure 1999- 2000)
In addition, there are 35
universities and degree awarding
institutions that are running education
programmes. This is made up of 15
Federal Universities, three (3) Federal
Universities of Technology, 9 State
Universities, 2 State Universities of
Technology and another 6 degree
awarding institutions, (U.M.E. Brochure,
1999-2000). Though, the grade II colleges
have been totally faced out in almost all the
States of the Federal, but there are Distant
Learning Studies (DLS) organised by the
National Teachers’ Institute (NTI) to replace
the grade II teachers’ programmes.
Development of
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Nigeria
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West Africa Journal of Educational
Research 3(1
RECOMMENDATIONS
Despite the enormous number of teacher
training institutions and   the production
of teachers in large numbers in the country,
there is still acute shortage of teachers in
our educational institutions. It is hereby
recommended that both the governments
and private organisations should help in the
establishment of more teacher training
institutions in the country to solve the
problem of shortage of teachers.   With the
increase in wages and salaries by the
government, teachers are called upon to
reciprocate the good gesture of the
government by being more dedicated and
committed to their jobs.
REFERENCE
Adeyinka, A. A. (1971.). , The development of
secondary grammar school education in the
western slate of Nigeria 1908-1968. M.Ed.
Dissertation-University of Ibadan.
Adeyinka, A. A. (1993) The Development of
secondary education in Oyo, Ogun and Ondo
States of Nigeria, 1908-1980, Occasional
publication 1, unilorin . Faculty of Education
Adeyinka, A. A. (1998); History of education in
Nigeria Mimeograph
Ajayi, J.F.A (1965). Christian missions in
Nigeria 1845-1881: The making of new elite-
Ibadan history series 1. London: Longman.
Ayandele, E A. (1966). The missionary impact
on modern Nigeria, 1812- 1914: A political
and social analysis - Ibadan, history series 3
London: Longman.
Fafunwa. A. B (1974). History of education in
Nigeria. London: George Allen and Unwin
Ltd.
Fajana, A. (1978), Education in Nigeria,
1847-1930: A historical analysis
Longman: Printing Press.
Federal Republic of Nigeria (1977) National
policy on education. Lagos. Federal Ministry
of information.
Solaru, T. T. (1964) Teacher training in Nigeria.
Ibadan; University Press
Taiwo, C.O. (1980). Tim Nigerian education
system: fast, present & future. Lagos: Nelson
Pitman Ltd.