Assessment of influence of history and government teaching on Human Rights Awareness in selected schools in Nakuru District

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to assess the influence of History and Government teaching on human rights awareness in selected secondary schools in Nakuru District. The research sought to find out the extent of human rights awareness among the form three History and Government students through the History and Government teaching, establish ways through which form three History and Government students exercise fundamental rights, and to investigate the challenges encountered by History and Government teachers in teaching human rights. The theoretical basis of this study borrowed from two main theories: Paulo Freire's Libertarian educational theory which lays emphasis on student participation and critical consciousness in education, and Benjamin Bloom's taxonomies of learning which was used in determining the level of human rights teaching along the cognitive and affective domains.The research design used was descriptive in form of a sample survey. A sample of 88 Form three students, 14 History and Government teachers, 13 school principals and 1 District Quality and Standards Officer was studied from 14 selected secondary schools. The sample size used was 25% of the population, a percentage supported by Tuckman (1988). Data was collected through the use of questionnaires, interviews and lesson observation checklists. The data was analysed through both qualitative and quantitative approaches, using critical method and descriptive statistics, respectively The main findings of this study revealed human rights awareness was inadequate in regard to knowledge, attitude was positive towards teaching but negative towards examination orientation and exercise of fundamental rights. Hence, human rights awareness was ranked at rhetoric level. The ways by which human rights was exercised were few and mainly limited to horizontal level. The main challenges facing teaching of human rights include inadequate teacher preparation, few refresher courses, use of teacher-centred methods, insufficient instructional resources, dominance of low -level questioning, and examination -orientation of History and Government.The study recommended to Ministry of Education and other human rights education stakeholders that the extent of human rights awareness can be enhanced. In addition, it suggested other ways of exercising human rights awareness and offered possible solutions to overcome challenges facing teaching of human rights in secondary schools.