Why Mother-Tongue Instruction Remains Elusive in Nigerian Classrooms

The implementation of mother-tongue instruction is constrained by several interrelated challenges that undermine its effectiveness in practice. These challenges cluster around four dimensions - stakeholder, logistical, institutional, and political economy. Collectively, these constitute what can be termed the ‘SLIP’ gap: A fitting acronym which captures how well-intentioned policies often “slip” between commitment and execution, leaving mother-tongue instruction inconsistently applied across classrooms. While this article focuses primarily on Nigeria, the SLIP gap framework is relevant across SSA, as many countries face similar constraints in their language policies.

Parents, teachers, and students – the primary stakeholders in education - often hold preferences that run counter to policy goals. These attitudes, shaped by social and economic aspirations, frequently steer classroom practice toward English rather than indigenous languages.

Parental expectations are particularly influential. Studies from Nigeria and elsewhere in SSA show that parents consistently prioritize English, associating it with academic success and upward mobility. In some cases, resistance has been so strong that parents have withdrawn their children from schools using indigenous languages. This reflects a broader social perception that English opens economic and global opportunities, while local languages may limit them.

Teachers’ attitudes mirror these tensions. In Zamfara State in Nigeria, most teachers questioned the necessity of mother-tongue policy, reporting that pupils preferred English and viewed indigenous languages as irrelevant for international examinations. Yet these same teachers acknowledged that students were more motivated and learned more effectively when taught in their mother tongue. This contradiction illustrates how entrenched assumptions about English’s superiority can override recognition of the pedagogical benefits of indigenous languages.

Beyond stakeholder attitudes, schools face practical obstacles relating to their material, infrastructural, and linguistic conditions.
Implementing mother-tongue instruction requires textbooks, teaching materials, and teachers trained to deliver instruction in indigenous languages – resources that remain scarce. Only 14 percent of surveyed teachers had access to relevant mother-tongue materials, while most primary textbooks, aside from language subjects, are written exclusively in English (Trudell, 2018). In practice, this forces teachers to rely on English-language texts, particularly in rural areas, and constantly navigate between English materials and local-language teaching.

Nigeria’s extraordinary linguistic diversity further complicates implementation. With more than 500 spoken languages, including three dominant indigenous languages - Hausa, Igbo, and Yoruba - alongside hundreds of minority languages, no single mother tongue can serve as a universal medium of instruction. Rapid urbanization and migration produce linguistically mixed classrooms, making it nearly impossible to assign one “appropriate” language of instruction. Even when indigenous languages are used, they may not align with students’ mother tongues.

Compounding these difficulties is the absence of standardized orthographies for many languages, which makes producing consistent materials and training teachers challenging. Governments also often lack reliable data on the distribution of languages across communities, further complicating assigning mother tongues to schools, particularly in linguistically diverse regions. 

Effective implementation requires a strong institutional foundation, with teacher preparation at its core. Yet Nigeria’s primary teacher training institutions remain disconnected from the realities of mother-tongue instruction. For instance, the abandonment of the Grade II teacher training system, once meant for preparing primary school teachers, has left universities and colleges of education as the main training route. Yet, these programs are generalized, producing educators for various levels without specific preparation for lower primary teaching, where mother-tongue instruction is most critical.

As a result, the institutional gaps in teacher education translate directly into logistical and classroom challenges. Schools face shortages of qualified teachers in the communities where they are most needed, and many available teachers lack both the pedagogical preparation and linguistic capacity to teach in the local languages.

The federal governance structure of education in Nigeria further complicates matters. While the federal government anchors mother-tongue policy through setting national standards, implementation is left to states that often lack operational guidance, monitoring mechanisms, or funding streams.

Political factors create some of the most persistent obstacles to implementing mother-tongue instruction. These challenges are embedded in the way language policies are designed, interpreted, and contested within Nigeria’s multilingual setting.

A fundamental challenge lies in defining “mother tongue.” Nigeria ’s 2013 NPE mandates that “the medium of instruction in [all] primary school shall be the language of the immediate environment for the first three years in monolingual communities…from the fourth year, English shall progressively be used as a medium of instruction.” This formulation creates significant ambiguity. The very idea of a “monolingual community” is difficult to apply in practice, given Nigeria’s fluid and dynamic language use, and the policy provides little guidance on how to define the “language of the immediate environment” in multilingual contexts. In urban areas shaped by migration, children’s mother tongues often differ from the dominant community language, making it unclear which language should serve as the medium of instruction. Without clear definitions or mechanisms for interpretation, the LOI provision remains highly contested.

Another challenge concerns the national unity versus diversity dilemma. Since independence, English has served as Nigeria’s official language and is promoted as a “neutral” language of national unity, modernity, and progress. This ideology is reinforced through education policy, which encourages every Nigerian to learn English and one of the three major indigenous languages in addition to their own mother tongue. In this political climate, mother-tongue instruction struggles to gain support, as it is endorsed in principle but rarely enforced in practice.

While the obstacles to mother-tongue instruction are well-documented, they often remain fragmented and discussed in isolation.  The SLIP Gap framework proposes an integrative framework that captures the interconnections between different types of barriers and provides policymakers with a clear diagnostic tool. By emphasizing interconnecting challenges, the SLIP framework helps policymakers identify where reforms should be targeted. It highlights the need for coordinated reforms that tackle multiple interconnected barriers, offering policymakers and practitioners a clearer pathway for interventions.