Muslim Education Quarterly, Vol. 22, No.
3 & 4, 2005 Islamization
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'. The IslamicAcademy,Cambridge,U.K.
,,~r.
ISLAMIZATION OF THE CURRICULUM: AN AGENDA
FOR MODEL .ISLAMIC NURSERY SCHOOLS IN
NIGERIA
Rafiu Ibrahim Adebayo
Introduction
Pre-primary education, according to the National Policy on Education, is "the
education given in an educational institution to children aged three to five plus prior
to their entering the primary school."! The first five years of a child are very crucial
and important in his life, as whatever he is exposed to during this period has a serious
and lasting effect on him in future. No serious government takes the education of its
citizens at that stage with levity. In France, the central government shares the largest
responsibility of the total cost of educating the children while the local authority
provides the remainder. In England and Wales, it is the local authorities that control
and administer the pre-school education through nationally prepared guidelines. In
West Germany, the pre-primary institutions are privately owned.' This is equally the
case in Nigeria.
As precious as the pre-primary education is, it is sad to note that it received
an unappreciable attention by the Nigerian government and citizens for a long time.
The National Curriculum Conference held in Lagos in September 1969, as historic
as it was, failed to address any issue related to pre-primary education. Rather, it
focused much on primary, secondary and tertiary education, teacher education,
science and technical education as well as women's education.' The 6-3-3-4 system
of education is silent about pre-primary education as well. It was not until recently
that the Federal Government of Nigeria broke its silence on it and realized the need
to have a say in the conduct of nursery education and thus clearly stated the purpose
and direction of pre-primary education in Nigeria in the National Policy on Education
(NPE) published in 1977 and revised in 1981 and 1998. This policy stipulates that the
first ladder of education would be handled and manned by private individuals but
monitored by the government." Consequently, the Nigerian Educational Research
Council (N .E.R.C.) started to organize series of seminars, workshops and lectures to
educate proprietors of nursery schools on how the goals of nursery education could
be achieved.
The indelibility of the knowledge acquired by young and innocent children
suggests the paramount importance of early childhood education. Knowledge in
childhood is likened to an engraved mark on a rock, which is difficult to rub off. As
it is better to train boys than to mend men, the Holy Prophet Muhammad (p.b.u.h.)
emphatically mentioned that children must be religiously educated in their early
of the Curriculum 5
stages. He asked parents to command their children to observe salat (prayer) when
they are seven years of age. In another instance, he instructed that the moment a child
is able to distinguish between the left and the right hands, he should be commanded
to pray. They should be given elementary knowledge of Islam before this time. This
is because a child can only be asked to pray after he has been taught what to say while
praying, how to pray, whom to pray to and other pre-requisites of prayer. S-owingthe
seed of 'tman (belief) and Islam in the heart of children was not taken lightly by the
companions of the Prophet. Once a man was caught for drinking in Ramadan and
when ~Jiecase was brought before 'Umar, he remarked: "Woe to you! Even our
children are keeping fast in this month.'?
Pre-primary education is not a new development among Muslims in Nigeria.
Before the advent of Western education in the country, early Islamic and Qur'anic
~ education was given prominence among the Muslims. The first stage of Qur'anic
education started as early as the third year of life. Classes were held at Mallams'
houses under the shade of trees and in the mosque premises. Major Denham and
Captain Clapperton observed that such schools were scattered all over Nigeria, as
they saw them in places like Kuka, Katsina and Sokoto between 1821 and 1830. In
1961 there were about 27,600 Qur'anic schools with a total of about 423,000 pupils
in northern Nigeria," At this level of education, emphasis was laid on learning shorter
chapters of the Qur'an through repetition and by rote, the alphabet of the Arabic
language as well as the acquisition of some writing skills.
In the Nigerian situation, the reasons for establishing contemporary nursery
~ institutions are summed up in the words of Orebanjo who says:
1 ;:
The increasing awareness in education resulting from the UPE
(Universal Primary Education) scheme, the need for working mothers l:j ,
to leave their children in safe hands, the dwindling number of domestic
hands, nannies and grandmothers and other factors led to the
establishment of these Institutions in urban and rural areas."
It is an undeniable fact that nursery schools are established to create an atmosphere
that is favourable for the children to use language for comparing, describing,
analyzing and explaining. The language is no other than English. The mother tongue
is thus relegated to the lowest ebb. Under the pretext of providing the above
opportunities for children, the Christians started establishing nursery institutions as
a means of transforming their religious culture and tenets. The failure of the Muslims
to realize that education is a product of a particular worldview and is tailored towards
some particular socio-historical and civilizational contexts, made them register their
children and wards into these Christian oriented schools. Before they realized it, their
children had started praying in Jesus' name, closing their eyes while praying and
shouting Halleluyah. The little Islamic culture imbibed from home was technically
~ knocked out of their hearts and instead of developing interest in their religion, they
were taught to hate it unconsciously.
The reaction of some conscious Muslim organizations and individuals to the
evangelization plot of the Christians via nursery education culminated in the
establishment of Muslim nursery schools where Muslim working parents could leave
their children to be exposed to Western education without losing their religious
 Muslim Education Quarterly
6
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identity. The dwindling patronage of Qur'anic schools by Muslims equally called for
the establishment of IslamicaJly oriented nursery schools. Except in rare cases, most
Qur'anic schools operate only in the afternoon for children to attend after their normal
Western school hours," The financial constraints facing most of the Qur' anic schools
as a result of running 'free education' by them forced many of these schools to
metamorphose into Islamic nursery primary schools where fees are charged and
parents are ready to pay.
The involvement of Muslims in the contemporary nursery education business
is a new development in Nigeria. Such schools are expected to caITY out dual roles
of meeting the challenges of Western education as well as creating an environment
conducive to learning Islamic oriented disciplines. In a bid to combine these two
responsibilities, many of these schools have fallen into either of the two extremes of
introducing too much Arabic subjects into their curriculum or giving too much
priority to Western subjects with the result that the Islamic ones are gradually pushed
out. Hence the need to propound an agenda for lslamizing the curriculum of Islamic
nursery schools to enable them to function effectively in the two areas of Western
and Islamic education.
A Critique of the Dominant Nursery School Curriculum
Various attempts to define, classify, analyze and conceptualize the word 'curriculum'
have resulted into loss of some of its essential realities. While some take it to mean
what teachers teach and what learners learn, it is a synonym of syllabus, course of
study, scheme of work, lesson note or lesson plan to some. However, such narrow and
shallow definitions have been rectified by Wilkins who sees curriculum as "the
overall learning programme in a school which covers time-tabled lessons, sports,
social activities and all other facilities through which the school aids the development
of its pupils."? In other words, curriculum consists of the programme of studies,
programme of activities and programmes of guidance. The programme of studies
refers to all academic subjects offered in schools, while the programme of activities
includes inter-scholastic and inter-moral activities like athletics, school publications,
music programmes, clubs and societies, all which vitalize the curriculum. The
programme of guidance involves guidance services rendered in the school. Concisely,
curriculum is the totality of all the experiences, planned or unplanned, which the
child is exposed to within the four walls of the school.
The profanity of the aims and objectives of the dominant nursery school
curriculum is one of the serious drawbacks of the curriculum. The secularist
modernist worldview as well as the dismissal of God as a major characteristic of
Western education generally raises its ugly head in the nursery curriculum. According
to the Nigerian Educational Research Council, the general goals of nursery education
in Nigeria are:
(i) To effect a smooth transition from home to school and to provide adequate
care and supervision for the children while their parents are at work;
(ii) To help the child to adjust to social norms;
(iii) To inculcate in the child a spirit of enquiry and creativity through the
exploration of nature and the local environment, playing with toys, and
artistic and musical activities, etc;
Islamization of the Curriculum 7
(iv) To teach good habits especially good health; and
(v) To teach the child the basic academic skills.'?
One important manifestation of the goals is that they are tailored towards producing
godless children who right from the onset of their lives are devoid of seeking
knowledge of their Creator. It thus produces a materialistic personality in the
individual who looks at religion and spiritual needs as private and not basic to human
life on this earth.'!
, In realisation of the above objectives, subjects like Creative Art, Social Norms,
Physical and Health Education, Language and Communication Skills, Mathematical
Skills as well as Scientific and Reflective Thinking are prescribed by the Nigerian
Educational Research Council for nursery schools. Guidelines on these subjects are
~VI made available for effective teaching and learning .12 This further reveals the secularist
tendency of nursery education curriculum. In this curriculum guideline, religious
education is conspicuously absent. Education without religion is like a body without
soul, and the absence of soul in the body makes it hopeless, useless and valueless.
Mutahheri aptly observes the result of such kind of education when he says:
Knowledge without faith is a sharp sword in the hand of a drunken
brute. It is a lamp in the hand of a thief to help him pick up the best
articles at midnight. That is why there is not the least difference in the
nature and conduct of the faithless man of today who has knowledge
and the faithless man of yesterday who had no knowledge. After all
what is the difference between the Churchills, Johnsons, Nixons and
Stalins of today and the Pharaohs, Genglis Khans and Attilas of yore?"
ri,
Apart from the above, any education aiming at effecting a smooth transition from
home to school but which lacks religious education at that crucial level of education
may be contrary to the cultural state of the environment which education must portray.
It thus becomes irrelevant to the majority of Nigerians who profess one religion or the
other; hence the first goal of nursery education is rendered unachievable. Realizing
this shortcoming in the nursery curriculum, some schools introduced Religious
'%y Education into their curriculum ..A sort of window dressing, Islamic Studies, is
introduced into some so-called Islamic nursery schools curriculum as a subject,
thereby giving the false impression that pure Islamic tenets are imparted to the young
ones. Or what can we say of some Christian proprietors who include Islamic Studies
as a subject into their schools' curriculum to lure unconscious Muslim parents to bring
their children to their schools? This attitude is confirmed by Salaudeen when he writes:
The inclusion of Islamic Studies in most of the nursery schools is
simply to make them attractive to Muslim parents who will assume
'~ that the aspect of Islamic education is being taken care of. In fact, it is
merely window-dressing."
The force of homogenization, hegemonization and Europeanization in the name of
globalization has eroded not only the Islamic culture from the innocent minds of the
young pupils, but also their natural language. The medium of instruction in the
 8 Muslim Education Quarterly
r
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conventional nursery schools is English. The standard of nursery schools is measured
by the level of their students' mastery of the language. Without any doubt, English is
the lingua franca in every nursery school in Nigeria. This, however, is at the expense
of the mother tongue, which according to the National Policy on Education should be
the prescribed language of instruction at that level of education. IS This creates a gap
between the theory and practice of education in the country. According to Fafunwa,
instruction through the mother tongue at the early stage of education helps to develop
curiosity, manipulative ability, manual dexterity, mechanical comprehension and the
hand-eye coordination." One evil effect of emphasizing a foreign language over the
mother tongue is that it isolates children from their culture and from their nature. They
thus become specialists in a foreign language, unable to use their own mother tongue
and unable to function well in their own world. Thus, education at this stage fails to play
the role of cultural transformation and preservation, whereas according to AI-Attas
"education preserves the basic structure of society by conserving all that is worthwhile
in basic values and institutions by transmitting them to the next generation and by
renewing culture afresh whenever degeneration, stagnation or loss of values occurs."?
Another significant problem with nursery education in Nigeria is the siting of
the nursery schools. The use of residential houses and face-to-face type of rooms as
classrooms is one of the common characteristics of nursery schools in the country.
Some are even located very near market squares directly on the main road, while
large halls, verandas, garages and sheds with varying degrees of ventilation,
sanitation, illumination, equipment and infrastructure are the physical features of
many of these schools. As a result of this lack of available space in some of these
schools, the provision for outdoor activities is grossly inadequate while the manner
of overcrowding of pupils in the classrooms is quite outrageous. The case is not
different even in public primary schools. Lamenting on the pathetic status of public
primary schools, the ex-minister of Education, Iyorchia Ayu noted, "not many schools
could boast of desks, dusters, chalk and staff quarters. Overcrowded classrooms and
dilapidated structures remained the typical feature of primary school system.?"
Another glaring shortcoming of the government policy on nursery education is
that it makes no provision for the government's pre-primary schools, which can serve
as a model for the ones established by private individuals and voluntary organizations.
Coupled with this is the influence of materialism on the government policy itself. At
different levels, the government charges exorbitant amount of money as registration
and annual renewal fees. This restricts nursery education to the middle cadre of the
society who can afford the high fees charged by these schools in order for them to
meet the financial demand of the government. Thus, government regulations guiding
the establishment of private nursery schools connote that the proprietors must not
necessarily need to be qualified professionally nor committed to the needs of children,
but must be rich enough to pay the exorbitant amount as registration and renewal fees
to the government. The throat-cutting school fees consequent upon the government
charges no doubt adds to the burden of the Muslims community, as many cannot afford
to pay due to the size of the family in addition to other factors such as indolence and
insensitivity on their part, as noticed by Shehu.!? Thus the backwardness of the
Muslims in the acquisition of nursery education is imminent.
With the above critical appraisal of the contemporary nursery education
system, we contend that there is a need for the Muslims to design and formulate their
Islamization of the Curriculum 9
own nursery education by Islamizing the curriculum of the Muslim schools or else
they will find their schools as centres of promoting anti-Islamic education, centres of
Islamic marginalization and centres of breeding Muslim children against the
worldview and culture of their religion.
An Agenda for Islamic Nursery Schools
The only available course of action for all Islamic nursery schools is no other than
Islamizing their curriculum. This becomes incontestable in view of the dual roles
expected of any Islamic school, namely, functioning effectively as a centre for the
propagation of Islamic culture and production of people who will be effectively
functional in the contemporary Nigerian situation in terms of Western education.
Failure to Islamize the curriculum means, an Islamic school will incredulously be
undoing its worldview and will be producing un-Islamic Muslims. This is also the
view of Qutb who succinctly put forward two suggestions on how to avoid such a
pathetic situation, saying:
If we are serious about giving religion its true place in educational
curricula, we have to do two things almost simultaneously. First, we
must not restrict religious guidance to the formal traditional lesson.
Second, we must reconsider the syllabuses devised for this particular
lesson and re-evaluate them in most parts of the Muslim world. The
objective of religious education is to produce a Muslim man or woman.
This end cannot be achieved through a few disintegrated pieces of
religious information to be learnt by heart and tested at the end of the
school year, especially if one's concepts, attitudes, morals and modes
of behaviour are all non- or anti- Islamic.P
A curriculum becomes Islamized when its programmes of studies, activities
and guidance in a school are enriched and vitalised with Islamic teachings and
principles. So, by the Islamization of the curriculum, we mean the practice of
intellectual and other planned and unplanned activities in the school based on the
Islamic concept of the universe, life and man, which a child is exposed to under the
control of the school. In this regard, the agenda for Islamizing the curriculum involves
the following.
(a) Reformulation of aims and objectives of Nursery Education
The secular nature of Western education has been a major concern for the Muslim
intellectuals. The mundane and profane nature of Western education takes care of the
terrestrial world with no consideration at all for the celestial world. Thus a
comprehensive Islamic philosophy of ~ducation was defined in the First World
Conference on Muslim Education in 1977 as follows:
Education should aim at the balanced growth of the total personality of
Man through the training of Man's spirit, intellect, rational self, feelings
and bodily senses. Education should cater therefore for the growth of
Man in all its aspects: spiritual, intellectual, imaginative, physical,
 10 Muslim Education Quarterly
." scientific, linguistic, both individually and collectively and motivate
all these aspects towards goodness and the attainment of perfection.
The ultimate aim of Muslim education lies in the realisation of
complete submission to Allah on the level of the individual, the
community and humanity at large 21
The above aim of education shows a balanced interaction between the belief system,
the knowledge system and the value system, which does not exist in the Western
education system. As such, we want to uphold the aims and objectives for setting up
an Islamic nursery school as itemized by a scholar thus:
(i) To prepare and train the future generation to work as agents of Allah on earth.
(ii) To inculcate in the child the sense of love, care, affection, humility, equity,
honesty, integrity, justice and other values based on Islamic ethics.
(iii) To develop in the child a spirit of enquiry and creativity through the
exploration of nature and local environment so that he becomes conscious of
his responsibility to develop himself and his environment for the benefit of the
human race and his consequent accountability in the next world.
(iv) To teach the child the basic academic skills based on Islamic epistemology.
(v) To produce a conducive Islamic environment for the proper upbringing of the
child and the development of his faculties to realise the full potential of people.
(vi) To put in place amenities, both human and material, for all round development
of the child, spiritual, moral, mental, cultural and material in preparation for
the adult life."
(b) Reconstruction of Programmes of Studies
For any Islamic nursery school to function effectively in contemporary modem life
and for its products to interact meaningfully with their immediate environment,
adoption of the Western curriculum is very essential. However, such curriculum needs
to be adapted to suit the Islamic taste. In other words, it needs to be enriched with
Islamic ethics and values in such a way that the aims and objectives of Islamic
education can be realized in the realm of the Western curriculum. Through this, its
profane and secular nature will be replaced by divine and spiritual values. It is our
considered opinion that the following subjects should be taught from the Islamic
perspective in Islamic nursery schools:
(i) Mathematical Skills
The knowledge of mathematics becomes imperative in any Islamic school curriculum
considering its indispensability in religious rituals and practices like salat, rakat, hajj
and other religious ceremonies that require scientific understanding of the lunar
calendar. The laws of inheritance as well as waqf require proper knowledge of
mathematics too.
Counting and recognizing numbers, symbols, shapes and colours will be of
immense assistance for nursery school children to identify objects, colours of vehicles,
car numbers and home addresses. A proper handling of the subject by competent
teachers will assist the pupils to recognize the mighty power of Allah in creating
Islamization of the Curriculum 11
natural objects in various shapes, sizes and colours. As the Qur'an encourages finding
solutions to problems, pupils are also exposed to solving mathematical problems
using counting sticks, bottle tops, stones, seeds, matchsticks and some other materials.
With this they will be able to count and make simple calculations with numbers.
Though the mathematics curriculum of the Western education system seems neutral,
we feel it can be given an Islamic colour by using Islamic values, concepts and beliefs
and by using Islamic terminology wherever appropriate.
(ii) English Language
English is a medium of instruction in Nigeria through which effective instruction
with others outside the child's environment can take place. Any attempt to downgrade
r
the teaching of English in any Islamic school is like an attempt to create a wide gap
between the Muslims and the English speaking people in the fields of scientific,
economic, military and cultural achievements.
I
i It was the concession of the Muslim scholars who attended the Sixth
International Islamic Education Conference held in the Republic of South Africa that
the goals of teaching the English language in Islamic schools are "to enable learners
to develop to the full their potential, to understand and use the language so that they
may become better practising Muslims who will enjoin that which is right and eschew
evil. The spiritual, moral, intellectual, emotional and cultural development of the
learner will also be targeted via the teaching and learning of the language."?' The
rationale behind teaching the language in Islamic schools is summed up in the
f following statement as contained in the report:
The mastery of the spoken and written form of English will equip the
present and future generations not only to withstand the universal
barrage of propaganda and misinformation about Islam, but also to use
the language for the purpose of Da' wah as well as for the upliftment of
the Urnmah."
In Islamic schools, the teachers teaching English as a school subject must be well
equipped with Islamic knowledge so that they are able to conect mistakes about their
religion as contained in some English texts. Such spelling mistakes as 'Moslem', instead
of 'Muslim', 'Mecca' instead of 'Makkah', 'Mohammed' instead of 'Muhammad' are to
be corrected by them following the common transliteration style used by the Library of
Congress. It is equally asserted by Al-Faruqi that attempts by some scholars to translate
untranslatable Arabic words into English had led to the distortion of the original
meanings of such words. In such cases, the actual words must be applied while their
meanings are explained." Closely related to this is that some dictionary meanings of
l Islamic terminologies have been distorted or wrongly interpreted. 'Mohammed', for
instance,is interpretedas "the prophet who formed the Muslim religion", while 'Muslim'
is defined as "a person of the religion started by Mohammed." Gwong-Wad has rightly
observed that the opportunity of the flexibility and richness of the English language
coupled with the receptive nature of its nouns to acept new entries of lexical terms, has
been used as a weapon in the hands of non-Muslim users to discredit and disrepute
Islam." To drive home his point, he cited the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary
English which makes the entry of 'Mecca' in small letter 'rn', violating the language
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12 Muslim Education Quarterly
Islamization of the Curriculum 13
." rule of proper nouns, It thus becomes the responsibility of an English teacher to be Pupils must also be exposed to correct Islamic greetings and responses. They
conscious of these and avoid teaching his pupils such wrong concepts, while giving must be taught to say al-hamdu Zillah (praise be to Allah) whenever they sneeze,
approved Islamic concepts in their proper forms.
instead of "Excuse me". The expression yarhamuka' lldh. (May Allah's Blessings be
It has to be noted that some steps have been taken to discourage the learning upon you) must be said by a second person instead of 'sorry' by him while the
of English alphabets based on the conventional secular "A for Apple, B for Ball" cOJTespondingreply yahdikumu'llah. (May Allah guide you) be said by the person
method; and this has been replaced by learning Allah's attributes through an English
who sneezed to the second person,
alphabetical rhyme. A professor has put forward the following:
(iv) Scientific and Reflective Thinking
A is for ALLAH, Yes ALLAH is our only True God ,.
B is for ALLAH, The Beneficent tAr-Rahmany The objective of teaching science in any Islamic nursery school is for the child to
C is for ALLAH, The Compassionate (Ar-Ra/:lrm) observe nature and to reflect on the beauty and wonder of nature and be aware of
D is for ALLAH, The Dominant (Al-Qahhar) Allah as the Provider of everything.
E is for ALLAH, The Everlasting (AI-Baqr) For proper integration of scientific and Reflective Thinking into the Islamic
F is for ALLAH, The Forgiver (Al-Ghafar) school curriculum, we strongly suggest a practical approach whereby pupils, for
G is for ALLAH, The Guide (AI-Hadr) instance, are practically involved in planting of seeds, watching and observing their
H is for ALLAH, The Holy (Al-Quddus) growth. Pupils must be taken to flower gardens, river, poultry and animal farms for
I is for ALLAH, The Inheritor (Al- Warith) them to see the wonders of Allah. They should be shown such natural objects as the
J is for ALLAH, The Judge (Al-lfakam) sky, sun, rain, stars and many others while relevant examples must be drawn from
K is for ALLAH, The King (AI-Malik) them as well, This, to a large extent, will assist them to ponder and realise the oneness
L is for ALLAH, The Light of Heavens and Earth (An-Nur) of Allah, their Creator.
M is for ALLAH, The Mighty (Al- 'Az[z)
N is for ALLAH, The Noble (AI-Majrd) (v) Islamic Studies
o is for ALLAH, The Opener (Al-Fatta/:l) In order to foster the spiritual, emotional and intellectual consciousness of Islam
P is for ALLAH, The Patron (AI- Waliyy) among the pupils and to inculcate and develop 'tman (belief), taqwa (piety), love for
Q is for ALLAH, The Quickner (Al-Mu/:lyr) Islam, Islamic identity and noble characters in the pupils, Islamic Studies is
R is for ALLAH, The Reproducer iAl-Mu'tdi paramount among the subjects to be taught in any viable Islamic nursery school. To
S is for ALLAH, The Sustainer (Ar-Razzaq) start with, a conducive Islamic atmosphere needs to be ensured. Simple Islamic
T is for ALLAH, The True and The Truth (Al-lfaqq) etiquettes, and such topics as the pillars ofIslam, 'tman and its attributes, the primary
U is for ALLAH, The Ultimate (AI-Akhir) sources of the Islamic Law, names of some prophets, the Attributes of Allah and other
V is for ALLAH, The Vast (AI-Wasi') rudiments of Islamic Studies are expected to be taught.
W is for ALLAH, TheWise iAl-Haktmi Morality is another aspect of Islamic education a child should be exposed to.
X is for ALLAH, The Xylographer (AI-Muqrt) It is generally admitted that religious education has a crucial role to play in any
Y is for ALLAH, The Yield (An-Nafi') effective moral education programme. Morality can be injected into the pupils
Z is for ALLAH, The Zenith (Al- 'Aliyy)27 through telling stories of different personalities in Islam as well as living by practical
examples of the teachers. In short, such virtues as goodness to parents, obedience to
Although the rhyme above can hardly be taught with relevant instructional materials authority, friendliness, honesty, kindness are expected to be inculcated in the pupils
to facilitate effective teaching and learning, learning it by rote will sharpen the brain in Islamic schools so that they may grow as moral human beings.
of the pupils and it will equally give them the opportunity of memorizing the
attributes of Allah without much tears. (vi) Qur'anic Arabic
(iii) Social Norms Arabic is the universal language of Islam. It is the language of the Qur'an and the
language of the formal worship in Islam. As no one can study Islam effectively
Under this subject, pupils are exposed to learning social habits such as correct ~~
without having the knowledge of Arabic, it becomes incumbent upon any Islamic
greetings, respect for others, obeying simple instructions, toilet habits, proper dressing nursery school to introduce Arabic and the Qur 'an into its curriculum, Through this,
habits, knowing oneself and one's family, learning to use socially accepted the pre-primary Islamic school is able to function properly as an Islamic nursery
expressions for requests and appreciation and knowing about the neighbourhood. school with provision of a solid foundation in Islamic education including the ability
Through the study of man and his environment in general, pupils' hearts are opened to read the Qur 'an in Arabic. It is when this is achieved that the problems of producing
to the fear and love of Allah, their Creator.
half-baked Islamists and graduates in Islamic Studies who cannot read the Qur 'an in
-.:;:z
" 14 Muslim Education Quarterly
,"
its original language will be checked right from the grassroots level.
A child of nursery age must be able to recognise and identify letters of the
Arabic alphabet and vowels. He should be able to recite some Arabic rhymes and
poems and mention some objects in Arabic. Memorization of short chapters of the
Qur'an should also be introduced to train the child's memory. The use of audio-visual
aids could be of immense importance for the teachers to arouse the interest of the
pupils in the memorization exercise.
(c) Reshaping the Programme of Activities
As a matter of fact, all academic programmes in any Islamic nursery school must be
accompanied by programmes of activities, which promote incidental learning through
play. Play is as important to children as food. It is the major preoccupation of every
child before he is old enough to go to school. Through play, he learns how to handle
the objects around him, develops physically and socially, and through his interactions
with others, he develops morally. As such, play should be constructively monitored
for learning to take place informally. Enough play materials and educative toys must
be made available for the pupils to boost their learning. Since a corrupt environment
can corrupt the best of natures, while a good environment can encourage and sustain
the best that is within pupils, it becomes imperative to provide an environment for
them to play and interact with others, while they must be given enough time to play
for learning to take place unconsciously.
Games, music, drama and other scholastic activities in the school must be
adequately reshaped to portray Islamic teachings. Separate sports activities must be
organized for boys and girls during physical education lessons, and they must also
wear Islamic dress during such activities so that their bodies are not exposed
indecently.
In order to encourage and strengthen the 'tman, as well as to enrich their
commitment to Islam, pupils must also be encouraged to attend Islamic centers,
mosques, bookshops, libraries, and meet prominent Muslim personalities like
Shaykhs, Muslim Obas, Emirs and others. Excursions to important Islamic historical
places will equally assist in broadening their horizons intellectually and spiritually.
It is equally important that such societies as Literary and Debating Societies,
Farmers Club, Arabic Club, Junior Engineers and Technologists Society (JETS) be
Islarnically-oriented, both in their conduct and organization.
(d) Revitalizing the Programme of Guidance
Another major item in the line of action of an Islamic nursery school is to vitalize its
programme of guidance in the light of Islam. The school is expected to render guidance
services not only to the pupils but also to the parents. Through the school's programme
of guidance, pupils are assisted to experience smooth transition from home to school,
develop learning skills and values and participate meaningfully in the opportunities
provided by the school curricular and co-curricular activities. On the part of the
parents, they have the opportunity of understanding their children's educational
progress as well as developing realistic perception of their children's development in
relation to their potential. The guidance role of the schools calls for the appointment
of trained, capable and knowledgeable staff who will be role models for the pupils.
Islamization of the Curriculum 15
The Holy Qur'an and the Hadtth of the Prophet (p.b.u.h.) serve as the major
guide for the pupils. In other words, whatever guidance or counsel a teacher gives the
pupilS, must be in consonance with the dictates of Islam. Any theory that goes
contrary to this must not be allowed, as the school cannot afford to train the young
against the teachings of their religion.
(e) Designing a programme for exceptional children (children with special
educational needs)
,.
The inequality of human beings has different forms. We categorize exceptional
children on the basis of their peculiar natural characteristics. These include
intellectual, communicative, sensory, physical and behavioural characteristics. A child
B also becomes exceptional, for example, by virtue of the fact that he loses his father
at a tender age. A child should not be denied his right to education because of certain
physical defects in him. As such there is the need for private Islamic nursery schools
to design a programme for such children. This can take the form of organizing special
schools where all the pupils who have the same disability are gathered together. It is
not too much to have a Muslim nursery school for the blind or the deaf, for instance.
In such special schools, teachers specially trained to teach children with particular
types of disabilities are employed, and special equipment designed to aid children
with such kind of disabilities is also made available. Where it is too cumbersome to
have special schools, the existing schools should accommodate the disabled ones at
least to allow them to interact with their non-disabled peers.
It needs to be mentioned that in Nigeria, the Christians have been taking a
leading role in the education of the disabled pupils. As far back as 1914, the Iberekodo
Leprosy Settlement in Abeokuta was founded by the Church Missionary Society
(CMS). The society was equally responsible for the establishment of the Oji River
Rehabilitation Centre in 1960. The Sudan Interior Mission established the first school
for the blind in 1940 on experimental basis while the Sudan United Mission
established the Gindiri School for the Blind in Barikin Ladi near Jos in 1953. In 1962,
the Catholic Mission with the assistance of the Irish Sisters of Charity established
the Pacelli School for blind children at Surulere Lagos. Also, the Wesley School for
t,. the Deaf, Yaba; and the Ibadan Mission for the Deaf and others are the handiwork of
the Christian missionaries." It was later that some state Governments saw the need
to complement the efforts of the missions in this laudable and highly rewarding
undertaking. It thus becomes imperative for Muslim proprietors of private schools to
stand to the task of educating the exceptional children to check the menace of street
begging. The purpose of designing special education programme as contained in the
National Policy on Education is:
(i) to give concrete meaning to the idea of equalizing educational opportunities,
their physical, mental, emotional disabilities notwithstanding,
"'~
(ii) to provide adequate education for all handicapped children and adults in order
that they may fully play their roles in the development of the nation, and
(iii) to provide opportunities for exceptionally gifted children to develop at their
own pace in the interest of the nation's economic and technological
development."
 16 Muslim Education Quarterly
"i
.' i
In order to provide opportunity for orphans to have easy access to education and to
become useful Muslim citizens, there is the need for a model Islamic nursery school
to design a programme that will take care of the orphans. This can be in the form of
providing free education for them so that they can be brought up and trained in
Islamic manner. Kind treatment of orphans is a responsibility imposed on capable
Muslims by Allah and the prophet and its reward in the hereafter is beyond measure.
As such, Muslim proprietors of nursery schools must see the need to have an agenda
for orphan education as a matter of religious duty.
Conclusion
Considering the fact that Islamic nursery schools have a dual role to play, it becomes
essential to marry and mend both Islamic and Western systems of education for
fruitful results. Islamizing the curriculum of Islamic nursery schools becomes
imperative for them to function well in these two realms. Through this, all the leaming
experiences the pupils are exposed to in the school become God-centered as against
the Western curriculum which is tailored along achieving material wealth of this life
alone with no consideration for the hereafter. Also, the programmes of activities,
studies and guidance in the school system, if Islamized, prepare and train the pupils
to work as agents of Allah on earth, as against the Western curriculum which has led
to social degeneration, misuse of authority and wealth and other socio-political and
economic ills in our society.
The big task ahead to achieve this goal in our educational set up is the training
of teachers to implement the Islamized curriculum. Or, how can the Western-trained
teachers cope with this new development? Furthermore, the secular texts which are
inimical to Islam are being used in Muslim schools. So, there is a serious and urgent
need for Muslim intellectuals and academics from various clisciplines to rise collectively
and individually to the task of writing textbooks on their areas of specialization from
the perspective of their religion. This requires combined efforts of scholars of Islam
and scholars of other disciplines. Moreover, our schools need to employ competent
Muslim teachers to take care of the pupils. These teachers must be sponsored to attend
various workshops, seminars and lectures on Islamization of knowledge for them to be
well-equipped and prepared to face the challenge before them.
Notes
1. Federal Republic of Nigeria, The National Policy on Education (3rd Edition) 1998, p. 10.
2. N. Hans, Comparative Education, London, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1982, pp. 254-320.
3. A.A. Adeyinka et al., "African Philosophy of Education with Particular Reference to
Nigeria" in Adekunle Akinyerni (Ed.), Book of Readings in Educational Theory and
Practice, vol. I, University of Ilorin, Institute of Education, 1992, pp. lll-112.
4. See, The National Policy on Education, (Revised) 1981, p. 10; and also the 1998 Revised
Edition, p. 1l.
5. Zakarya Kandhalwi, The Teachings of Islam, London, n.p., n.d., p. 205.
6. Albert Ozigi and Lawrence Ocho, Education in Northern Nigeria, London, George Allen
& Unwin, 1981,p. 7.
7. M.A. Orebanjo, "The Nigeria Nursery /Primary School- The Way Forward," WestAfrican
Islamization of the Curriculum 17
Journal of Education, vol. xxi No.1, 1980, p. 13.
8. Badrnos Yusuf, "An Examination of the Tradition of Qur'anic Learning in the Ilorin
Emirate of Nigeria," Journal of Arabic and Religious Studies (JARS), Vol. 12, University
of Ilorin, Department of Religions, Dec. 1995, pp. 61-64.
9. Edward Wilkins, Education in Practice, London, Evans Brothers, 1976, p. 60.
10. Nigerian Educational Research Council (NERC), Curriculum Guidelines for Nigerian
Pre-Primary (Nursery) Schools, Ibadan, Evans Brothers, 1988, pp. 8-9.
11. Farhan Ishaq (1989), "Islamization of the Discipline of Education", American Journal of
Islamic Social Sciences, Vol. 6, No.2. Herndon, IIIT/AMSS, 1989, pp. 309-314.
12. N.E.R.C., Curriculum Guideline, p. 10-27.
13. AyatulJah Murtaza Mutahheri,Islam, Man and Universe, Pakistan, The Islamic Seminary,
1977, p. 29.
14. Salaudeen Yusuf. (1991) "Islamization of Knowledge: A Workplan for Islamic Nursery
Education," Muslim Education Quarterly, Cambridge, The Islamic Academy, vol. 9, No.
1, 1991,p. 35.
15. See The National Policy on Education, 3rd Edition, p. 9.
16. A. Babs Fawunwa, "Education in the Mother tongue: A Nigerian Experience (The Six-year
(Yoruba medium), Primary Education Project at the University of Ife)", West African
Journal of Education, Vol. 19, No.2. 1975, pp. 213-227.
17. Salisu Sheu, "Islamizing the Education System: Toward an Alternative Education Theory
and Agenda for the Muslim Ummah in Nigeria," a paper presented at a two-day National
Workshop on Islamization of Knowledge jointly organized by IIIT Nigeria office and
UDUS Sokoto, 15th-16th May 2000, p. 5.
18. B.O. Ukeje, "Schooling: The Politics, Premise, Process, Practice and Product" in B. Ipaye
(Ed.), Research on Schooling in Nigeria, Introductory Readings, Ondo, Centre for
Research on Schooling, Adeyemi College of Education, 1995, pp. 146-147.
19. Salisu Sheu, "Islamizing the Education System ... ," see note 17, p.18.
20. Muhammad Qutb, "Religion, Knowledge and Education" in AI-Attas (Ed.), Aims and
Objectives of Islamic Education, Jeddah, King Abdul-Aziz University & Hodder and
Stoughton, 1979, p. 55.
21. SyedAli Ashraf, New Horizons in Muslim Education, Cambridge, Hodder and Stoughton
and the Islamic Academy, 1985, p. 4.
22. Ghulam Sarwar. (1996) "Islamic Education: Its Meaning, Problems and Prospects," Issues
in Islamic Education, London, The Muslim Educational Trust, 1996, pp. 13-14.
23. Interim Report on 6th International Islamic Education Conference (First International
Workshop) 20-25 September 1996, Islami~ College, Cape Town, South Africa, p. 21.
24. Interim Report, p. 21.
25. Ismail Raji AI-Faruqi, Toward Islamic English, U.S.A. IIIT, 1988, pp. 11-14.
26. Aliyu Umar Gwong-Wad, "Islamization of English Language and its Teaching in a Secular
State", Al-Ijtihtid- The Journal of Islamization of Knowledge and Contemporary Issues,
Vol. I, No.2, Kano , IIIT Nigeria Office, July 2000, pp. 78-79.
27. Hussain Akande Abdul-Kareem, "What Makes an Islamic School Truly Islamic." A Key
Note Address presented at the Annual National Conference of the Nigerian Association of
Model Islamic Schools (NAMIS) held at Government College Apata-Ganga, Ibadan
between 3rd and 5th April 2003, pp. 7-8.
28. S.O. Oladipo, Elements of Special Educption for Certificate Students, Oyo, Odumatt Press
and Publishers, 2000, pp. 11-14.
29. The National Policy on Education, 1998, p. 39.