The Challenges of Curriculum Implementation in Nigeria Teacher Education

Abstract

The importance of teachers to the socioeconomic development of any nation cannot be overemphasized. This is because teachers are responsible for the translation and implementation of educational policies, curriculum or course offerings. Teacher education therefore constitutes a conspicuous element in the totality of organized education, formal and non-formal subsystems. Conversely, the policy that all teachers in educational institutions should be professionally trained appears to be the most unfulfilled goal or policy as teachers from pre-primary to the university level remain largely untrained. In effect, the teacher education program appears not to prepare teachers to meet up with the challenges of the 21^st century. In this paper, effort was geared towards taking a cursory look at the challenges that has bedeviled the curriculum implementation in Nigerian teacher education institutions. it was therefore recommended amongst other things that a balance in the content of teacher education be established in terms of academic and professional content, selection of suitably qualified candidates for teacher education programmed, professionalization of teaching by the Teachers Registration Council (TRC), and adequately equipping teacher training institutions.

Keywords: Curriculum implementation, Challenges, Teacher education.