HOW CURRICULUM CONTENT AND PEDAGOGIES ARE UTILIZED FOR ENHANCING ENTREPRENEURIAL SKILLS AMONG BUSINESS EDUCATION UNDERGRADUATES

Abstract

The study focused on how curriculum content and pedagogies are utilized for the enhancement of entrepreneurial skills in business education undergraduates in colleges of Education in Delta State. Two research questions guided the study and two hypotheses were tested at 0.05 level of significance. The study adopted the descriptive survey research design. The study was carried out in Delta State Nigeria. The population of the study comprises 17,340 students in the colleges of Education in the Business education programmes. The sample of the study is 867 respondents drawn from the four colleges of education which is 5% of the students. A structured questionnaire containing 66 items validated by three experts in the Faculty of Education, Ebonyi State University was used for data collection. Test of reliability of the questionnaire was done using the Cronbach Alpha reliability method which gave co-efficient values of 0.92. The data collected from the respondents with regards to the research questions were analyzed using mean and standard deviation. The mean value was used to answer the research questions while the standard deviation was used to ascertain the homogeneity or otherwise of the respondents’ ratings, t-test were used to test the null hypotheses. Findings of the study revealed that business education students in colleges of education in the Delta state have been imparted with entrepreneurial skills and entrepreneurship education pedagogies used by lecturers in colleges of education in Delta state is at a low extent. Hypotheses tested shows that there is no significant difference between the mean ratings of male and female students of federal colleges of education on the extent entrepreneurship education curriculum inculcates entrepreneurial skills in undergraduates and there is no significant difference between the mean ratings of male and female students of federal colleges of education on the extent entrepreneurship education pedagogies are utilized for the enhancement of entrepreneurial skills in students. Based on the findings it was recommended among others that government through the National Colleges of Education Commission can set up special grants for frequent training and retraining of lecturers within and outside the country to bring them up-to-date with modern ideas and teaching methods of the subject matter. The government should ensure the adequate provision of comfortable lecture halls and seats that are equipped with requisite teaching and learning aids such as projectors, marker boards, public address system, properly ventilated and well-lit classrooms.

Keywords: Curriculum Content, Pedagogies, Entrepreneurial Skills, Business Education Students