ASSESSMENT OF EARLY CHILDHOOD CARE EDUCATION PROVIDERS’ ADHERENCE TO THE PROVISIONS OF NATIONAL MINIMUM STANDARD ON EARLYCHILDHOOD EDUCATION

ASSESSMENT OF EARLY CHILDHOOD CARE EDUCATION PROVIDERS’ ADHERENCE TO THE PROVISIONS OF NATIONAL MINIMUM STANDARD ON EARLYCHILDHOOD EDUCATION

The main purpose of this study is to assess the early childhood care education providers’ adherence to the national minimum standard in Zone C (Idoma) Education Area, Benue State. Five research questions and five hypotheses guided the study. The study adopted descriptive survey research design. The population of this study consisted of 5,999 head teachers and teachers in 170 primary schools in Zone C (Idoma) Education Area. The sample size was 381 head teachers and teachers drawn from the population. The sample was drawn using simple random technique. The instrument for data collection was a structured questionnaire titled “Early Childhood Care Education Providers’ Adherenc e to National Minimum Standard Questionnaire’s (ECCEPANMSQ) was adopted by the researcher. Three experts validated the instrument and the instrument yielded an overall reliability coefficient of 0.89. The data collected was analysed using mean and standard deviation to answer the research questions while t-test statistic was used to test the null hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The findings of the study were that: ECCE providers have not adhered to the requirements of the National minimum standard on the recruitment of teachers, the ECCE centres are not regularly supervised by the providers, the learning environment is not conducive enough, teaching materials are not used in line with the requirement of the National minimum standard and also children’s health is not well protected. Based on the findings of the study, conclusions were drawn and recommendations were made.