CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

The marriage of a youth in ancient society was parts of the responsibilities of his parents. The young man had no choice as to the choice of wife. In some cases a wife was married to him at a time. He could not accept to keep a wife. And all maintenance was done by the parents. Such marriages were regarded to be sacred and respected by the spouses. Parents were unnecessarily getting as to where their son was going to get his wife from. Marriages arranged by parents on the basis of family friendship ties rarely broke up in the past. Divorce which is the legal ending of marriage was also very rare in the past, because of the penalty associated with proven fidelity and the fear offending elders of both families. In Nigeria, there are clearly defined types of marriage. We have the church or statutory marriage, those performed at mosques and marriage constituted according to native law and customs of any ethnic group. One of the purposes of marriage is to have children and establish a family. When these children eventually arrive, they are regarded as blessing from God and they become both social and economic assets to their parents. The family this time needs a home to live in and feel secured.

Thus, home becomes a place where children are nurtured to become responsible to both themselves and the society in general. Such a home should be built on love, rust, mutual understanding and good planning to be able to met its universal goals. In a situation where love and understanding is lacking, such a home becomes filled with crack and fissures. Also, tension and anxiety becomes the order of the day. Thus intimately may result in divorce therefore become a personal misfortune for either of the spouse in any society. Although it may be considered as a universal escape for the inevitable tension in marriage. Divorce is actually a legal dissolution of the marital union which, involve the governance of the marriage bind between a husband and his wife. For a marriage to be successful there is the need for the couple to be in harmony mentally, physically and spiritually. In other words, the husband and the wife must have a common goal and each have to contribute his or her own towards the fulfillment in the family and the key word should be love.

STATEMENT OF PROBLEM

There are many problems with divorce or broken homes which at the long run reflect on the performance of children in schools. Some of these problems are; 1. There is increase in domestic work and redistribution of household chores, which leaves the children with little or no time for their studies 2. In security, step parent do not show much love and affection to their step children. Thus, these children suffer from mental retardation, personality improvement and are always miserable. They show behavioral responses like lying, stealing, building and playing truant in school. 3. Also, it has been observed that children from broken homes suffer some other problems such as non-provision of some basic material needs like non-provision of some basic materials needs like food, clothing and learning material etc. 4. Greeting of a gap on the children’s existence because there is no adult to guide and direct their behavior and desires as children learn by limitation. In view of this, the researcher is forced to wonder whether extra-relationship and financial problem could lead to broken home, and if broken homes, are they causes of decrease in the performance of children in schools. In that, a closer look at the turn out of secondary school graduates these days reveals a lot of half-cooked, half-boiled and half-baked scholars academically, socially and otherwise.

PURPOSE OF STUDY

The researcher is interested in the study of causes, problems and effects of divorce or broken homes in the performances of children in schools because of the present decrease children’s performance in schools which is giving much concern to most Nigerians as to where we are heading to. In view of this, this study is geared towards identifying the causes and problem of broken homes and the effects on the performance of children in some selected secondary schools in Oredo local government area. Also, to educated married couples and the general public of the consequences of divorce and or broken homes on the children and to encourage them to live harmoniously in order to bring up children who will successfully fit into the society and become useful to themselves and finally make necessary recommendations.