TOWARDS A NEW CURRICULUM PLAN AND DEVELOPMENT FOR ARCHITECTURAL EDUCATION IN NIGERIA

Abstract

Curriculum is a systematically organized course of teaching and learning that encompasses everything that students and teachers do. Planning is an act or process of achieving a goal, while development is the act to set forth possibilities of expansion by process of growth. Curriculum planning and development can therefore be simply defined as the act or process of achieving a systematically organized course of teaching and learning by process of growth. It is an important viable index for measuring adequacy of specialized courses in educational institutions. It is also an indicator which reveals the interdisciplinary attitude among specialized courses within and outside educational institutions. If properly planned and developed, it can form a significant force that will better the writing skills and critical thinking of graduates’ architects, thereby placing them among future renowned philosophical thinkers through pen or computer. Hence, the need to identify curriculum planning and development for architectural education as a panacea for proper upbringing of tomorrows graduate architects. The focus of this paper is directed at the strategies for curriculum planning and development procedures for effective architectural education in Nigeria. Special attention was given to teaching and learning of architecture in the higher institution, whereby philosophy, students, goals and objectives, structure and sequencing, instructional strategies, evaluation of learning, and evaluation of instruction were extensively discussed. Finally, useful suggestions were proffered towards successful implementation of the strategies.