Integrating Traditional African Education into Current Educational Practices: Suggestions for Primary School Pedagogy Integrating Traditional African Education into Current Educational Practices: Suggestions for Primary School Pedagogy 1

ABSTRACT This paper examines how traditional African educational approaches can be used with European methods in the teaching of young children at primary schools in Zimbabwe. From an African-centred perspective, European/Western education is viewed as 'compartmentalistic', limiting and potentially inhibitive of the communal, social, and cultural responsibilities expected of a fully initiated African adult. The paper takes the position that a re-look at African traditional knowledge dissemination system such as communal education, group learning, fireside folktales and legends, used in tandem with the European paradigm, will produce a better-cultured adult who fits comfortably in the frame of current developments on the African continent. The paper proposes a curriculum that recognises the value of African traditions as educational methods of teaching that can make learning more relevant and exciting for primary school going pupils