Unemployment and Poverty Rise in Nigeria: Implications for Increasing Learners’ Social-Emotional and Cognitive Development Through Inclusive Critical Storytelling Pedagogy

Abstract

This paper presented a review of research on factors that impact social-emotional and cognitive development (SEC) of children for their effective functioning in the society; the widening gap between SEC development of low and high income students, and as well highlighted reasons why teachers should care about these research findings and SEC development of poor learners. Poor social-emotional development is associated with anti-social behaviours which could have indirect negative effects – such as poor leadership, increased criminality, human rights violation, violence, poor societal development, etc. – on a society. Poor cognitive development affects individual’s executive functioning skills (e.g. critical thinking) which are vital for informed and good judgment or decision making. Factors, such as income, parenting style, brain development, nature of neighbourhood, personality, etc., are however, implicated as influencing SEC development. The paper further highlighted theoretical and empirical recommendations for bridging existing SEC gap between low and high income students, and situated the suggestions within a developing context, Nigeria. It showed what Nigeria –devastated by poverty and unemployment that hamper adequate SEC development– has done to bridge SEC gap between well-off and poor students (e.g. introduction of Universal Basic Education Scheme, free lunch, free textbooks, etc) and argued that many structural factors (geographical structure, corruption, etc.) limit their effectiveness as there are still high number of out-of-school children, and high level of absenteeism from and dropping out of school among school age students in the country. Recognizing that most teachers suffer socioecomonomic challenges as their students, and as well face structural challenges that limit their adoption and application of effective and efficient teaching practices and other solutions suggested in reviewed literature, the paper suggested inclusive critical storytelling pedagogy as an alternative for teachers in poor contexts. The paper discussed and illustrated how inclusive critical storytelling pedagogy could be applied by teachers for motivational, methodological, and evaluative purposes in the classroom to foster and promote SEC development among students, especially disadvantaged students.