PRESCHOOL TEACHERS’ PERSONALITY TRAITS AS PREDICTORS OF PUPILS’ LITERACY AND NUMERACY SKILLS IN DISTRICT II AREA OF LAGOS STATE, NIGERIA

Abstract

At the centre of philosophy of early childhood education as stipulated in the National Policy on Education, is the care, protection, stimulation and learning (literacy and numeracy) promoted among preschoolers aged 0 to 4years in a crèche or nursery. Therefore, the characteristics of preschool teachers to pursue these goals become a major concern. This study examined preschool teachers’ personality traits as predictors of pupils’ literacy and numeracy skills in District II Area of Lagos State. Five research questions were raised and four hypotheses were postulated to guide the study. The study adopted a correlational survey design. Multi-stage sampling technique was used to select One hundred and fifty (150) preschoolers and thirty (30) preschool teachers, who constituted the study’s sample. Three research instruments were used to collect data for the study. They include: Preschool Teachers Personality Rating Scale (PTPRS), Pre-schoolers Literacy Skill Test (PLST) and Pre-schoolers Numeracy Skill Test (PNST). The instruments were scrutinized by research experts. The data were collected by the researcher and some trained research assistants. Data collected were analysed using descriptive statistics of frequency counts, percentage, mean, and standard deviation for the research questions, while inferential statistics of multiple regression and correlational matrix were used to test the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. Findings from the study revealed that the extent to which preschool teachers demonstrate personality traits of openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism when teaching pre-schoolers is high. Again, the hypotheses revealed that the joint contributions of the personality traits (openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism) to pupils’ literacy and numeracy skills are 15.7% and 30.5% respectively. Based on the findings of this study, it was recommended among others that the federal and state government of Nigeria and other critical stakeholders should put in place practicable measures to always assess teachers’ personality traits before employment and also ensure they exhibit positive traits that can promote meaningful learning of relevant skills in literacy and numeracy at the preschool level.