The value of children among the nandi

This paper is a report of a study carried out among the Nandi of Kilibwoni Division in Nandi District. The paper sought to establish the importance of children among the Nandi. It has been found out that the Nandi community value and desire children for reasons, which range from socio-cultural, political and economic reasons. From the value placed on children, it was found out that every aspect of a Nandi life dwells in, and centred on children. Purposive sampling was used to come up with the old men and women, those with children, the childless, and the clergy who were interviewed. Use of interview schedules and observation methods were applied to get Primary data. Secondary data collected from libraries supported primary data. Parson's functionalism theory was adopted. Society is seen as a complex system of inter-related parts, each of which has consequences for the operation of the system, children included. This study adopted deterministic design to determine why the traditional Nandi hold high value for children. Purposive sampling enabled the researcher to arrive at the respondents desired for the study. Interview schedules were used where oral interviews were done on all correspondents. This allowed probing and discussion. Pilot testing of research instrument was done on a small sample of respondents. This was aimed at testing the reliability and validity of the research instruments. Descriptive method was applied to analyse data that had been collected.