Language, Teaching and Attrition: A Study on Selected Teachers Who Left the Profession

Oct 15, 2026

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Nigeria has more than 520 languages, creating major difficulties for classroom instruction when students share different language backgrounds, especially in North-Central Nigeria. The teaching mismatch contributes to teacher attrition in Niger State, where selected teachers left the profession due to students’ inability to understand the official language of instruction, English. The teachers link widespread final-exam failure to weak English comprehension. The paper recommends using Hausa as a main local language to improve understanding and reduce attrition.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages4

Reading Time10 min

AccessFree to download

Introduction

Teacher attrition in Nigeria

Teacher attrition trends in Northern Nigeria

Niger State Secondary School Board report (2010-2012)

Language teachers and staffing shortages

Advances in Language and Literary Studies ISSN: 2203-4714 Vol. 7 No. 1; February 2016 Australian International Academic Centre, Australia | | | | | --- | --- | --- | | | | | | Flourishing Creativity & Literacy | | | Language, Teaching and Attrition: A Study on Selected Teachers Who Left the Profession Aminu Aliyu Wushishi (Corresponding author) Center for interpretive and Qualitative Research (CIQR) Duquesne University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States E-mail: [amliyu@yahoo.com](amliyu@yahoo.com) Muhammed Baba Dept. of Education Foundations, Niger State College of Education Minna, Niger State, Nigeria Doi:10 .7575/aiac.alls.v.7n. 1p.1 URL: [http://dx.doi.org/10.7575/aiac.alls.v.7n.1p.1](http://dx.doi.org/10.7575/aiac.alls.v.7n.1p.1) Received: 18/08/2015 Accepted: 24/10/2015 Abstract Nigeria is a country with over 520 different languages, the multitude nature of languages is making instructions so difficult in Schools, particularly in North-Central Nigeria where they have students with different language background attending the same school. The difficulty of smooth teaching in this kind of situation is leading to attrition among teachers. This study examines the situation of selected teachers in Niger State, Nigeria, who left the teaching profession as a result of difficulty in teaching their students, whom they said cannot efficiently understand the official language of instruction (English) . The teachers highlighted their main reason of leaving the profession which is mainly associated with language problem among students, they added that, the massive failure of students in the final examination has a link with the student ’s inability to understand what the teachers are teaching because of their poor background in English language. The paper recommends the use of one major local language (Hausa) in teaching the students, this will make learning easy and students will efficiently comprehend instructions from their teachers, which may go a long way in reducing attrition. Keywords: Language, Teaching, Attrition 1. Introduction In Nigeria, there are concerns about the fact that teaching is a profession which is characterised by high rate of attrition (Bashar 2011) . The problem of teacher retention is regularly headlined in the media and attracted series of researches among scholars in the country. The worry lies within the fact that many teachers in Nigeria who had invested time and effort into qualifying to teach had chosen to leave the profession. Growing concern about nationwide teacher shortage has focused considerable attention on education and teaching profession, several conditions account to this national crisis including increasing population of students ’enrolment and teacher attrition (Garba 2012) . Throughout the decade, Nigerian schools required annual infusions of many new teachers to meet the demands of growing students’ enrolments, expanded years of schooling, and teacher attrition issues (Bashar 2011) . In a similar report, Adamu (2010) commented that school staffing problems are primarily due to excess demand resulting from a‘revolving door’where large numbers of teachers depart from their jobs for reasons other than retirement. While few numbers of Nigerian teachers remained stable in their positions, more teachers left the teaching profession than had entered. Thus, schools are losing more teachers than they are recruiting or retaining (Adamu 2010) . In Northern part of Nigeria, teacher attrition rate has rapidly raised within four years, in 2008 the rate was 13.9% but increased 20. 1% in 2012, majority of the teachers moved to other profession due to some reasons like; improved condition of service in other profession, less stress, and working hours (Garba 2012) . In a report released by Niger State Secondary School Board, (2012) the rate of attrition from 2010-2012 was analysed. It has shown that as at 2010 the state has 12,280 teachers while i

FAQs

Why does language diversity make teaching difficult in Nigeria?

Nigeria has over 520 languages, so students often come from different language backgrounds, making instruction difficult—especially when teaching relies on English as the official language of instruction.

How does the study link students’ language ability to teacher attrition?

Selected teachers report that their students cannot efficiently understand English, leading to teaching difficulties, widespread learning problems, and ultimately teachers leaving the profession.

What does the paper recommend to reduce attrition?

It recommends using one major local language—Hausa—in teaching so students can better comprehend instructions, supporting easier learning and potentially lowering teacher attrition.

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by Terk