CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background of the Study

The colonial education which was inherited by Nigeria was criticised for being too theoretical to be able to make meaningful impact on the life of Nigerians (Akinlua, 2007). Subjects taught in schools reflected the taste of the colonial education officials; hence school curricula were built around the existing colonial values. Students were supposed to mimic their teachers in subject like Mechanical Craft Practice which involved demonstration of competency. The same problem which informed dependency on past colonial education relics seems to have continued till date. Woolman (2001) was forced to comment on issue of this sort in his remark about African education. According to him, “African school systems today still follow the rigid structure of time periods and grade-level progression found in Western education.”

One definite thing expected of the educational institution to provide training to meet the demand for the human resource needs of the nation. The training of youth in the technical college aims at equipping them with useful skills and improving their knowledge in their desired areas of study. One such educational program that provides the youth opportunity to acquire skills and knowledge for effective nation building is the technical education program conducted in technical colleges.

Mechanical Craft Practice provides the youth with the practical skills in works pertaining to electrical installation, electrical windings, construction of electronic circuits, and maintenance work. However, it has been discovered that the persistently poor achievement of students in examination emanates mainly from the inappropriate teaching methods adopted by technical education teachers in the instruction of Mechanical Craft Practice as well as lack of adequate teaching facilities.