Abstract:
This study was designed to rate the training needs of adult education instructors in Anambra state. The specific purposes of the study were to ascertain the extent to which lack of adequate training on effective use of instructional materials; instructional development and methods of evaluation hinders the instructors’ educational outcome as well as the strategies for enhancing the competencies of adult education instructors in the adult learning centres in Anambra state. The study was guided by 4 research questions and two null hypotheses. The design of the study was a descriptive survey design; stratified random sampling technique by balloting was used in drawing the sample composition for the study. The sample consisted of 421 respondents made up of 107 male and 314 female instructors in the 163 state owned adult education centres in Anambra state. Rating of the Training Needs of Adult Education Instructors Questionnaire (RTNAEIQ) was the main instrument used for data collection. The instrument was validated by 4 research experts, two in Adult Education and two in Educational Measurement and Evaluation. The instrument overall reliability coefficient was 0.85 which showed that it was highly reliable. The data collected from the 4 research questions of the study were analyzed using mean scores and standard deviations while t-test analysis was used to test the two null-hypotheses formulated for the study. The data analyses revealed among others that: Lack of adequate training on effective use of instructional materials, instructional development and methods of evaluation to a high extent hinder the educational outcome of the instructors in their learning centres. It also revealed that adequate funding of adult education programmes by the government, sponsoring of the instructors to refresher courses/continuous training programmes and professionalization of the field of adult education are strategies for enhancing their competencies in the adult education learning centres. It was recommended among others that adult education instructors should be sponsored to workshops/conferences by the government, non-government organizations and stakeholders in the education sector, SAME, NMEC and NNCAE should organize regular refresher courses/continuous training programmes for the instructors to keep them updated on current issues in the field of adult education and also that instructors should be well remunerated like their counterparts in other governmental parastatals.
