MARGARET CHIDERA
The United Nations Children’s Fund, UNICEF, has said that only one in three children has access to Early Child Education (ECE), in Nigeria.
According to the UN body, this represents only 36 per cent of the total child population in the country, adding that about 10 million children are not enrolled in ECE.
Speaking during a two-day Media Dialogue on Early Child Education (ECE) in Nigeria, UNICEF Education Specialist, Yetunde Oluwatosin, emphasised the need for leaders to prioritise ECE.
According to Oluwatosin, early childhood is a critical period which any country must pay attention to, as doing so would improve the economic outcome of the child.
She said that the period must be consciously built to contribute to the child’s early transformation.
She said, “It has been observed that a large inequalities persist between the poorest children and the richest children’s ECE attendance rate translating to eight per cent and 87 per cent respectively.
“Globally, fewer than one in three children ages three to four attend ECE.” In West and Central Africa, only one in four (24 per cent) attend ECE.
“In Nigeria, only one in three children (36 per cent) attend but at least 10 million children are not enrolled.“Research has shown that children who attend ECE perform better in academy and have greater earning potential as they grow over the years,” she said.
She further listed factors that affect ECE to include; poor subsector analysis planning and coordination which includes low workforce, poor training and infrastructure, inadequate spending on ECE, low public demand for ECE, insufficient ECE teaching and learning materials and low support for early learning.
Oluwatosin explained that the challenges of ECE are systemic, especially the education sector analysis in terms of the workforce and strength to get infrastructure.
She said that ECE should be a specialised area that must be planned for.
She noted that adequate data to drive early learning is critical to achieve progress.
Oluwatosin further stressed the need to strengthen the roles of parents as the first educator of the child saying; “We also need to strengthen the roles of parents as the first educator of the child, provide adequate funding for pre-primary education, build the capacity of teachers and provide adequate curriculum for ECE.“
Earlier, UNICEF Communication Specialist, Dr Geoffrey Njoku, said
there was a need to focus on ECE as it is the bedrock of literacy and numeracy everywhere across the globe.
“We want to have children who can code, the world has changed and we need Nigerian children to be at par with their mates across the globe. And so we are here to push that agenda and advocate for improved ECE in Nigeria.”
Also, Dr Amy Panyi, the country coordinator of the Early Childhood Development Initiative (ECDI), said play-based pre-primary education is the best way children can learn at home or in learning centres.
According to her, the play-based learning process helps children develop their psychosocial skills, build self-confidence and esteem, improve their critical thinking ability, be innovative and exploitative and become creative.
“As Early Child Educators, you don’t tell a child that you’re wrong because it demoralises them and makes the child lose confidence and ability to be curious about his or her environment.
“Our aim is to let our curriculum at the early stage be refelctive of a play-based learning conducive for child development”, she added.
ECE also known as nursery education, is a branch of education theory that relates to the teaching of children from birth up to the age of eight.
It is also described as an important period in a child’s development process. This process involves the use of play-based education for the learning process among children.
