The purpo se of thi s study is t o analyse wh e ther thernEthiopian Curri culum of primary schoo l i s work-oriented orrnno t. To ach i eve thi s a im, t e xtbook co nt en t analysis andrnqu e st i onnai res have b een used as data co llect ion instruments.rnFour s t eps have been f o ll owed i n ana ly s ing t he conten trnof th e t ex tbooks . Th e first step i s concerned wi th text bookrnselection. Th e second step involves defining the researchrnprob l ems in t e rm s o f categoriE's in relation t o the thE'sisrnbas i c qUE'st i ons. Th e th ird s t ep deals with ide n tif y ing thernt ec hnique of mea surement or uni t o f content. The last steprnidentifies th e system o f enum e rati o n. Th en . da t a obta inedrnfrom text bo ok ana lysi s and questi onnaire are int e rpreted andrnsummari zed.rnThe results of the analysis show th a t thirty- sevenrnp e rcpnt of thp co nt ents are work - rpf ere nced. Of th ese wo rkfc,rnfer"nced paragra ph s , thirty - ti1r f'E' percent are hIlle - c o llarrnrefe r enced and four per cent are ,.- h i te - co l l ar - l'io r k-referenced,rnTIle quest t o find n llt thp students ocrupational aspirationsrnhas r evealed that con t rary t o th e cnntpn t s of the t ex t books,rntheir occupational aspira tion is i ncl ined to wh ite-c o llarrncateg o ri es o f occupat i o n s .rnOn th e basis of the results. it is co n c luded that, inrnmos t aspects, th e present content of th e Ethiopian e lementaryrnsc ho o l t ex tbooks do n o t co nt ai n a ba lan ced pr opo rtion o frnco ntents which r e fl ec t wo rk orientation . Thoug h the f e ..work-rnor i en t ed paragraphs re f l ected a blue-collar ca t ego r y ofrn" ork b ia s , th ey fail t o develop on s tu de nt s pos i tive att itudernt oward s ma nual work,