History and peace education in Nigeria: panacea for national development

Abstract

The significance of history and peace education in fostering national development cannot be overemphasized, this paper has skillfully tried as much as possible to uproots the contributions of history education to peaceful coexistence in societies and the roles peace education can play in fostering national development, it found that, Peace education gives rise to tolerance and respect for variety of opinions in a social settings; and it also discovered that, history serves as a milestone and vehicle for personal and cultural identity. In essence, sound historical values and peace education will always give rise to or conceives cohesion which consequently gives birth to peace and development in society. Therefore, it remains a logical fact that no meaningful development occurs nor sustains its gains without recourse to history; in the same vein, progress turns to retrogress in a situation of anarchy! Then, there arises the need to assess the roles of history and peace education to national cohesion and consequent development. It was therefore recommended among others that history and peace education to be made an integral part of Nigeria’s educational curriculum at all levels for inculcating tolerance, patriotism and nationalism into the citizen’s mindsets.