Ogunlola, 'Layo2018-06-072018-06-072011978-99919-70-03-5http://hdl.handle.net/123456789/412Introduction: Several scholars and government agents have written in favour of the need to adopt the child’s mother tongue as a medium of instruction in our schools. Among them are: Fafunwa 1974, Majasan 1975, Awoniyi 1978, Omotoye 1996, Federal Government of Nigeria 1998, Odetokun 2010, to mention just a few. This paper examines the prospects and problems of the use of the child’s mother—tongue language for instruction in schools using the Nigeria situation and the Yoruba mother-tongue as the yardstick. At the end, a number of solutions are proffered. The Universal Primary Education programme was launched in September, 1976 by General Olusegun Obasanjo, the then Military Head of State ‘of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. The implementation came as a result of the recommendations of the National Curriculum Conference of 1989 which as well gave birth to the evolution of the 6-3-34 system of education, which states that: Government will see to it that the medium of instruction in the Primary School is initially the mother-tongue or the language of the immediate community and at a later stage, English (N.P.E.1981). 2 In its review of 1998, the policy states that the medium of instruction in the primary school shall be the language of the environment for the first three years. During this period, English language shall be taught as a subject. From the fourth year, English shall progressively be used as a medium of instruction and the language of the immediate environment and French shall be taught as subjects.enMother-tongueInstruction in SchoolYorubaBook chapter