Globally, there is current emphasis on entrepreneurship education mostly in developing countries. Despite the laudable objectives of entrepreneurship education, observation shows that business education graduates in South East and South South States of Nigeria still lack the requisite skills needed for self-employment. The main aim of this study was to determine the imperatives of teaching methods in improving the entrepreneurial competencies of business education students in Universities in the South East and South South States of Nigeria for self-employment. The study adopted a survey research design and it covered the 15 Universities in the South East and South South States of Nigeria offering business education programme. The population comprised 109 respondents. The entire population was used; therefore, no sample was drawn. A self –structured four point scale questionnaire was used for data collection and it was validated by three experts. The reliability was determined using Cronbach Alpha while the reliability co-efficient yielded 0.73. Mean and Standard deviation were used to answer the research question while analysis of variance was used to test the hypothesis at 0.05 level of significance. Based on the research findings, the respondents agreed that the use of practical activities and demonstration method as an instructional skill could improve the entrepreneurial competencies of business education students and also the use of mentorship could equally do the same. The study recommends that the use of practical activities and demonstration method should be highly utilized by business educators in teaching entrepreneurship education in order to improve the entrepreneurial competencies of business education students for self-employment. Also, business educators should encourage the students to associate with their mentors so as to tap from their wealth of experience.
Keywords: Business Education, Teaching method, entrepreneurial competencies self-employment.
