The Use of New Technologies for the Teaching of the Igbo Language in Schools: Challenges and Prospects

Abstract

This paper examines the experience of teachers in the use of new technologies to teach the Igbo language spoken in South East Nigeria. The study investigates the extent to which new technologies are available and accessible to Igbo teachers, the competence of the Igbo language teachers in the new technologies and the challenges they face that limit the use of the new technologies in the teaching of the Igbo language. Forty respondents from two Nigerian universities were used available and accessible to the Igbo language teachers, and most of them are very competent in use. Furthermore, they are positively disposed to the use of computers application software are not available by default for Igbo. This creates the need to advocate some interventions to enhance the utility of the Igbo language as a vehicle for new technologies in language teaching. Comparisons of responses from to and expertise in the new technologies as well as perception of the need for and challenges to these technologies.

Rescuing Igbo Language From Endangerment: The Role of Library and Information Technologies

“…Hence these materials can be made readily available when they are properly documented in both print and electric/virtual forms. Iloene, M. I., Iloene, G. O., Mbah, E. E. and Mbah, B. M. (2013) carried out a research on how to teach the Igbo language using computer and other modern instructional materials. There research centered on two universities where they discovered that computers and some of the modern instructional aides are readily available with competent hands but one of the major problems faced by these institutions is that most of the computers do not have the software for encoding and decoding of Igbo language.…”

Igbo Language and Literature in Classroom Discourse: a pedagogical experimente

“…Despite the popularity of the Igbo ethnic group and culture, and with growing studies in Igbo language, literature and culture, very few studies have been conducted on Igbo language instruction. Iloene et al (2013) and Mbah et al (2013) have examined the use of new technologies for the teaching of Igbo language in schools. However, these studies concentrated mainly on the instruction of Igbo language using media technologies such as podcasts, without any interest in Igbo literature.…”