The National Senior Secondary Education Commission ( NSSEC) has commenced a five-day training programme for English Language and Mathematics Teachers in Ilorin, Kwara State, North Central Nigeria.
The training programme became necessary due to the poor performance of students in English and Mathematics across the country.
The 116 participants at the training programme were drawn from the North-Central States of the federation and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja.
The State governor, AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq who was represented by the Commissioner for Education and Human Capital Development, Hajiya Saadat Modibbo- Kawu declared the training programme open.
In his welcome address, the executive secretary of NSSEC, Prof Benjamin Abakpa, said the commission was kicking off the first edition of reskilling of teachers after pilot testing of the manuals on difficult concepts in English Language and Mathematics with teachers from selected public and private schools at FCT.
” This workshop becomes imperative because of the poor performance of learners, most especially in the two core subjects. The essence of the workshop is to identify the difficult concept in English Language and Mathematics and proffer possible pedagogical skills to tackle the menace facing the learners and take them from not knowing to solving equations and putting tenses together correctly,” he said.
Professor Abakpa disclosed that the commission realized from inception the constant failure of learners in the two core subjects; English Language and Mathematics needed to gain admission into tertiary institutions.
He added that the unpleasant failure necessitated the commission to develop a training manual and its guide for qualitative teaching and learning of difficult concepts and a better understanding of the curriculum.
The Executive Secretary, further explained that the training workshop is to determine which topics in the English language and mathematics curriculum for senior secondary schools are perceived by learners and teachers as difficult.
He, therefore, expressed the hope that the knowledge gained during the training will trickle down to relevant teachers in the classroom for effective teaching and excellent performance in the two core subjects.
The chairperson of the commission, Nimota Akanbi, noted that the performance of students in English Language and Mathematics in the external examinations has been consistently poor.
She charged the resource persons at the training programme to simplify the teaching methods of the two core subjects for the teachers who will in turn do the same for their students.
Akanbi praised Governor AbdulRazaq for his commitment to training and retraining of teachers in the state.
She urged the participants to pay rapt attention to the resource persons who are ready to give an in-depth explanation on the difficult concepts of the two subject areas and also implored them to ask questions where necessary for better understanding for good service delivery.
Akanbi enjoined the trainees to step down the training to relevant teachers in the classroom in order to reduce the rate of failure amongst senior secondary school learners.
Declaring the programme open, Governor AbdulRazaq thanked the commission for choosing Kwara as the host of the training programme.
He said the state had invested a lot of resources on the education sector in the state, especially in training and retraining of teachers.
The governor noted that the novel KwaraLEARN scheme has impacted greatly on teaching and learning in schools in the state.
A cross-section of participants and resource persons who spoke with VON Correspondent at the workshop in Ilorin expressed the hope that they would be better knowledgeable in the core subjects and transfer such to the students for better understanding.
PIAK
