By Mike Adeyemi
The 36th annual conference of Social Studies Educationist Association of Nigeria (SOSAN) has been held in Ilorin, Kwara State
The virtual conference with theme: ‘Value Education in a plural society : Treading the holistic path ” was held virtually at the Kwara State College of Education, Ilorin.
The Social Studies Educationists Association of Nigeria, is a registered professional organisation that promotes the teaching of knowledge content, values and attitude and socio-cognitive skills development of Nigerian children and youths, using Social Studies as the carrier-subject.
This year’s conference focused on various issues on the teaching and learning of Social Studies in educational institutions in Niget8s.
In a communiqué signed by the President, Social Studies Educationists Association of Nigeria, Prof. AbdulRaheem Yusuf said, “Since the disarticulation of religious subjects from Religion and National Values Education Curriculum, to form the National Value Education, essentially, the remnant of the curriculum is Social Studies.
“Civic Education at the Senior Secondary School level is a continuation of the Social Studies Curriculum of the UBEC, but with more focus on political education and at utter negligence of the value-laden content of Social Studies, which has been made to terminate at the Upper Basic Class Three.
“Besides, the Curriculum is not enjoying the smooth progressiveness that it should have, by not having Social Studies at the Senior Secondary School; hence creating a huge gap between basic and tertiary education.
“The gap mentioned above is a consequence of the non-implementation of the 1998 National Policy on Education provision which states that Social Studies is one of the core subjects at the Senior Secondary School level.
The communiqué added that “Only the curriculum of the Social Studies Teacher Education programmes at the tertiary levels (especially the NCE and B.Ed. Social Studies Programmes) prepares pre-service teachers to teach the National Values Education and Civic Education at the schools.
“At present, there is no synergy between teacher’s preparation and classroom practice. There is therefore the need to fashion out a strong connection between preparation and classroom practice.
“The present tripartite (Social Studies, Civic Education and Security Education) packaged in a so-called compound-subject curriculum called National Values Education are fraught with overlapping contents. There is therefore the need to streamline them to avoid boredom arising from repetition.
“Nigerian children and youth will be better prepared to be more aware of their social and physical environments and trained to develop adequate values and skills, and to contribute to national development under Social Studies Curriculum than the current use of the National Value Education and Civic Education Curricula in Basic Education and the Senior Secondary level respectively.
“Most of the series of deviant behaviours (youth restiveness, drug abuse, cultism, cybercrimes, terrorism, prostitution, banditry, armed robbery, kidnapping, corruption and so on) that the nation is experiencing nowadays are attributable to impartation of disjointed and dismembered learning which Social Studies would have addressed if accorded its rightful recognition in the school system.
“The fragmentation of Social Studies into three (Civic Education, Social Studies and Security Education) explains the struggles that History and Government Teachers, graduates of Mass Communication and the likes make in the name of wanting to teach values as if to say that the subject needs no professional preparation.
