CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

Background of the Study

Education is as old as Mankind. The pre-literate people practiced their own form of education which helped them addressed their problems. The society being simple and primitive, the curriculum of what is taught was also simple.

The term “Education” has no concise meaning or definition this is so because the meaning and interpretations assigned to education differ with generations as well as religious political connotations.

Okeke B.S. (2004.3) Opined that, “available literature development of education attest to the fact that education has been influenced  great thinker, law, forms of government, modes of social life, culture and physical life” Trend analysis and conducted  on education gives credence to the fact that education does lend itself to any endurable definition that has claims to unalterable truth. Education, Okeke further states, has permanent as well as constantly, changing attributes that try to adapt to new demands and circumstances. Hence, theories and practice of education differ from society to society and civilization to another.

To many, Education is seen as a solution for vast range of tasks of the society and the bed rock for national development.

According to Ocho (1988:28-29), as sited in Ozochi (2008), the central purpose of education is virtue or character training. Other purposes of education which Ocho identifies includes; the acquisition of knowledge, understanding and physical skills. The individual requires these competencies in order to enable him live fully and contribute to the development of his society.

The society being simple and primitive, the curriculum of what is taught was also simple. More so, such contents were not recorded as the art of writing was inverted then. They there fore resource to oral passage of their cultural heritage. However as the society grow over time and the art of writing invented, the need for documentation of culture and its transmission became imperative. Today, the world has become a global village with it attendant competitiveness, education sector cannot be left behind in this global changes

However, there are basically (3) three forms of education namely; in form this refers to the various processes through which one acquire education. The informal education refers to the traditional education which was predominant in Nigeria before the arrival of Christian missionaries who introduced western education. The formal education as the name suggests is the concisions and deliberate effort is made to organize the process of obtaining education  in the school, it has variants such as: missionary, colonial, western, Koranic or/Islamic Education respectively. Finally, the Non-formal Education made to organize learning out side the regular school activity –regular school curriculum, the formal school reputation and organization.