Gst 201 course guide
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| 2.0 OBJECTIVES At the end of this unit, you should be able to explain what education actually means describe the historical tie between education and National development discuss the Nigerian educational system before and after independence and evaluate the Nigerian educational system of today etc. 3.0 MAIN CONTENT 3.1 Education and National Development in History You should always remember that the strong relationship between education and development cannot be overemphasized. We can even say with confidence that education is to a nation what the mind is to the body. This is not only true for Nigeria alone but is a fact worldwide. Even in ancient Greece, best known as the cradle of Western scholarship, education was the backbone or a searchlight boomed on society. In ancient Greece, for instance, education was a standard bearer and a blender of minds, behaviour and cherished values. Greek social order and institutions were centered on the philosophy of great educationists of the kind of Socrates, Plato and Aristotle. However, education also followed the life cycle system. Onovbaydedo (1995) puts it better in this way the journey of reason and western learning from the ancient through the classical to the modern world are both eventful and chequered. They were exorcised by the medieval Church of perceived traces of heresy and tinted with Christianity. They experienced a rebirth in the Renaissance of the 15 th and 16 th centuries and in turn gave birth to the Enlightenment in which educational structures were modernized. Even in Europe, although modern educationist forms were taken afield by the missionaries and various agents of imperialism, they nonetheless successfully engendered the industrial revolution and breathtaking development. But what happened in the Nigerian case |