ethanporcaro/eric-fulltext-meta huggingface dataset:
Structural and Social Constraints in the Teaching of Life Skills for HIV/AIDS Prevention in Malawi Primary Schools
Author: Chirwa, Grames
Date: 2014-06-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Elementary School Students,Teacher Attitudes,Administrator Attitudes,Principals,Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (AIDS),Foreign Countries,Daily Living Skills,Social Problems,Health Education,Curriculum Implementation,Sex Education,Poverty,Hunger,Barriers

The Ministry of Education in Malawi introduced a life skills education program with the intention to empower children with appropriate information and skills to deal with social and health problems affecting the nation, including the fight against HIV infections. This study investigated factors affecting the teaching of the life skills education in four primary schools in the Zomba district, Malawi. Cornbleth's (1990) notions of the structural and social contexts and Whitaker's (1993) identification of key role players in curriculum implementation framed the study. Data was collected through interviews with teachers and principals and observations of teachers' lessons. Findings suggest that the teaching of life skills is constrained by a variety of social and structural contextual factors such as the poor conditions under which teachers are working; greater attention given to subjects such as maths and languages; the cascade model of training teachers and the short duration of training; the inaccessible language in teachers guides; hunger and poverty of learners; lack of community support for sex education; both teachers and learners being infected or affected by the AIDS/HIV pandemic; teachers felt it is inappropriate to teach sexual education to 9 and 10 year old learners. The structural and social barriers to effective life skills education within the current framework indicate the need for alternative sex HIV/AIDS education complementary to the primary school curriculum.
The Mismatch between First-Year Students&apos; Expectations and Experience alongside University Access and Success: A South African University Case Study
Author: Pather, Subethra
Date: 2018-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Foreign Countries,College Freshmen,Student Attitudes,Expectation,Student Experience,Access to Education,Academic Achievement,Preservice Teachers,Preservice Teacher Education,Differences,Interpersonal Relationship,Clubs,Learner Engagement,Help Seeking

The widening of access into higher education institutions in South Africa has rapidly transformed the student population to become more diverse. Students vary in age, race, culture, backgrounds, educational experiences, academic potential and university expectations. Widening university access with the commensurate need for success requires intervention mechanisms to ensure university management addresses student challenges, especially at first-year undergraduate level. Access and success cannot be achieved without understanding students' university expectations and experiences, as these are critical factors that are integrated with retention and success. This paper examines the gap between students' expectation and experience and argues that the intensity of such a gap can negatively impact the goal of achieving access and success amongst students from diverse backgrounds. The study utilised a pre- and post-survey to collect quantitative data from 95 first-year teacher education students at a university of technology in South Africa. The results indicate that there is a significant gap between students' expectations and their actual university experience with regard to the following indicators: social engagement, academic engagement and seeking academic support. It is posited that such a mismatch between students' university expectations and experience can result in students feeling disconnected to the institution, which could lead to academic failure and high drop-out rates. This study recommends that an intentionally planned first-year experience programme is required to entrench a more inclusive and sustainable first-year experience for 'all students' which could close the gap between students' expectation and experience and access and success.
A Foundation for Foundation Phase Teacher Education: Making Wise Educational Judgements
Author: Murris, Karin
Date: 2014-12-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Foreign Countries,Teacher Education Programs,Role of Education,Preservice Teacher Education,Pedagogical Content Knowledge,Socialization,Teacher Qualifications,Student Development,Child Development,Democracy,Social Justice,Integrity,Reflection,Aesthetics,Creativity,Play,Teaching Methods,Curriculum,Semiotics,Early Childhood Education

We start our paper with a critical exploration of the current 'back to basics' approach in South African foundation phase teacher education with its emphasis on strengthening the teaching of subject knowledge. We claim that such a proposal first demands an answer to the question 'what is foundational in foundation phase teaching?' We propose an answer in three stages. First we argue that teacher education should be concerned not only with schooling or qualification (knowledge, skills and dispositions) and socialisation, but, drawing on Gert Biesta's work, also with subjectification (educating the person towards the ability to make wise educational judgements). Secondly, these three aims of education lead to five core principles, and we finish by showing how these principles inform our storied, thinking and multimodal/semiotic curriculum. Our answer to our leading question is that pedagogical 'know-how' and views of 'child' and 'childhood' constitute the subject knowledge that is foundational in the foundation phase curriculum.
Improving Some Cognitive Functions, Specifically Executive Functions in Grade R Learners
Author: Esterhuizen, Stef
Date: 2014-06-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Foreign Countries,Executive Function,Cognitive Development,Intervention,Inferences,Metacognition,Inhibition,Short Term Memory,Cognitive Processes,Preschool Education,Preschool Children,Teaching Methods

This study established the effects of a researcher-developed curriculum-based intervention programme. The intervention was grounded on principles of Feuerstein's ideas about 'mediated learning'. The aim of the intervention was specifically to address children's executive functions, which are generally regarded as prerequisites for cognitive development. We studied a selected group of South African grade R learners (n = 20). A quasi-experimental design was employed to collect quantitative data on rotational basis from experimental groups A and B, by means of dynamic assessment with the Children's Inferential Thinking Modifiability (CITM) test during pretest, post-test and delayed post-test occasions. The test data was intended to elicit the extent to which the intervention that had focused on enhancing executive functions had contributed to the participants' application of cognitive and metacognitive skills and strategies. Qualitative data captured participants' application of cognitive processes in the input, elaboration, and output phases of the designed learning process, as well as the characteristics of their inhibitory control functions. A striking finding was the improvement noted in the children's application of the following executive functions, namely working memory, cognitive flexibility and inhibitory control.
Integrating Different Forms of Knowledge in the Teaching Qualification Diploma in Grade R Teaching
Author: Rousseau, Nici
Date: 2014-06-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Epistemology,Teacher Education,Teacher Educators,Foreign Countries,Knowledge Base for Teaching,Teacher Education Curriculum,Theory Practice Relationship,Curriculum Design,Curriculum Implementation

From a view of multiple types of knowledge for a blend in teacher education, the paper discusses the need for epistemological diversity in the types of knowledge for grade R teacher education. I claim in this article that for epistemological diversity, innovative mixes of knowledge are required and that they have to be explicated. The argument of the article is that the decisions made by teacher educators when constructing a curriculum for a new grade R qualification are especially challenging because of the narrow purpose of the qualification. The paper offers an analysis of various models of knowledge types and mixes, outlining each one's purpose. Finally, the paper provides an epistemological distillation in a conceptual framework which can guide the process of curriculum making, offering all participants a chance to contribute to the layers underneath the patina of the painting that offers life to the curriculum.
The Counter-Terrorist Campus: Securitisation Theory and University Securitisation -- Three Models
Author: Gearon, Liam
Date: 2017-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Foreign Countries,Terrorism,School Security,Universities,Campuses,Prevention,Public Agencies,National Security,Models,Academic Freedom

With intensified threats to global security from international terrorism, universities have become a focus for security concerns and marked as locus of special interest for the monitoring of extremism and counter-terrorism efforts by intelligence agencies worldwide. Drawing on initiatives in the United Kingdom and United States, I re-frame three -- covert, overt and covert-overt -- intersections of education, security and intelligence studies as a theoretical milieu by which to understand such counter-terrorism efforts. Against the backdrop of new legislative guidance for universities in an era of global terrorism and counter-terrorism efforts by security and intelligence agencies and their Governments, and through a review of Open-Source security/intelligence concerning universities in the United Kingdom and the United States, I show how this interstitial (covert, overt and covert-overt) complexity can be further understood by the overarching relationship between securitisation theory and university securitisation. An emergent securitised concept of university life is important because de facto it will potentially effect radical change upon the nature and purposes of the university itself. A current-day situation replete with anxiety and uncertainty, the article frames not only a sharply contested and still unfolding political agenda for universities but a challenge to the very nature and purposes of the university in the face of a potentially existential threat. Terrorism and counterterrorism, as manifest today, may well thus be altering the aims and purposes of the university in ways we as yet do not fully know or understand. This article advances that knowledge and understanding through a theoretical conceptualisation: the counter-terrorist campus.
The Use of Workbooks in South African Grade 3 Mathematics Classrooms
Author: Mathews, Corin
Date: 2014-06-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Foreign Countries,Workbooks,Elementary School Mathematics,Grade 3,Case Studies,Mathematics Teachers,Instructional Effectiveness,Teacher Education Programs,Educational Practices,Teacher Attitudes,Supplementary Reading Materials

The poor performance of South African learners on national and international benchmark tests in mathematics and literacy has prompted the South African Department of Basic Education (DBE) to devise intervention strategies, one of which is the provision of workbooks for learners. This paper is based on a case study of six grade 3 teachers' use of DBE workbooks. Data from classroom observations and interviews are reported and analysed in relation to literature on mathematical and pedagogical resources. The key finding is that teachers use the workbooks in disparate ways as a resource and that the majority of the teachers in the case study use the workbooks in ways that do not resonate with the DBE's intentions. We argue that the provision of resources alone may not lead to improved teaching and learning in primary school mathematics classrooms and that pre-service and in-service teacher education programmes need to include a focus on how resources such as workbooks can be utilised optimally.
Teacher Characteristics and Student Performance: An Analysis Using Hierarchical Linear Modelling
Author: Armstrong, Paula
Date: 2015-12-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Foreign Countries,Teacher Characteristics,Academic Achievement,Hierarchical Linear Modeling,Correlation,Demography,Gender Differences,Age Differences,Teacher Background,Teaching Experience,Student Characteristics,Socioeconomic Status,Mathematics Achievement,Teacher Education

This research makes use of hierarchical linear modelling to investigate which teacher characteristics are significantly associated with student performance. Using data from the SACMEQ III study of 2007, an interesting and potentially important finding is that younger teachers are better able to improve the mean mathematics performance of their students. Furthermore, younger teachers themselves perform better on subject tests than do their older counterparts. Identical models are run for sub-Saharan countries bordering on South Africa and for Kenya, and the strong relationship between teacher age and student performance is not observed. Similarly, the model is run for South Africa using data from SACMEQ II (conducted in 2002), and the relationship between teacher age and student performance is also not observed. It must be noted that South African teachers were not tested in SACMEQ II, hence it was not possible to observe differences in subject knowledge amongst teachers in different cohorts and it was also not possible to control for teachers' level of subject knowledge when observing the relationship between teacher age and student performance. Changes in teacher education in the late 1990s and early 2000s may explain the difference observed in the later data set in the performance of younger teachers relative to their older counterparts.
Transmission and Transformation in Higher Education: Indigenisation, Internationalisation and Transculturality
Author: Horsthemke, Kai
Date: 2017-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Higher Education,Foreign Countries,Educational Practices,Global Approach,Culturally Relevant Education,International Cooperation,Standards,Afrocentrism,Cultural Pluralism,Indigenous Populations

There have been various approaches to the transmission and transformation of systems, practices, knowledge and concepts in higher education in recent decades, chief among which are drives towards indigenisation, on the one hand, and towards internationalisation, on the other. After briefly discussing and dispensing with radical versions of these, theories that reject any claim to validity or legitimacy by the rival approach, this article examines more nuanced accounts that deserve appropriately serious consideration. Thus, in the former instance, there is an emphasis on the local that nonetheless acknowledges a debt to the global, whereas conversely the emphasis on the global is seen as compatible with an acknowledgement of diversity, difference and particularity. What is gained and what is lost in these various approaches to educational transmission and transformation? After reflecting, in this regard, on lessons from both Africa and Europe -- in particular, on the debates in South Africa around Africanisation and decolonisation, and in Germany around global interdependence -- I cautiously endorse the idea of 'transculturality' (as contrasted with 'multiculturality' and 'interculturality') as a promising philosophical perspective on transmission of knowledge and practices, and as conceptualising transformation of higher education. The role of philosophy, in particular, consists in part in counteracting the hegemony of both traditional and homogenising ('colonising') authority.
Informing Principal Policy Reforms in South Africa through Data-Based Evidence
Author: Wills, Gabrielle
Date: 2015-12-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Foreign Countries,Principals,Educational Policy,Administrator Effectiveness,Educational Change,Administrator Characteristics,School Demography,Credentials,Faculty Mobility,Tenure,Supply and Demand,Retirement

In the past decade there has been a notable shift in South African education policy that raises the value of school leadership as a lever for learning improvements. Despite a growing discourse on school leadership, there has been a lack of empirical based evidence on principals to inform, validate or debate the efficacy of proposed policies in raising the calibre of school principals. Drawing on findings from a larger study to understand the labour market for school principals in South Africa, this paper highlights four overarching characteristics of this market with implications for informing principal policy reforms. The paper notes that improving the design and implementation of policies guiding the appointment process for principals is a matter of urgency. A substantial and increasing number of principal replacements are taking place across South African schools given the rising age profile of school principals. In a context of low levels of principal mobility and high tenure, the leadership trajectory of the average school is established for nearly a decade with each principal replacement. Evidence-based policy making has a strong role to play in getting this right.
Childhood Education Student Teachers&apos; Responses to a Simulation Game on Food Security
Author: Petersen, Nadine F.
Date: 2014-06-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Foreign Countries,Preservice Teachers,Elementary School Teachers,Educational Games,Simulation,Video Technology,Teaching Methods,Food,Group Discussion,Consciousness Raising,Social Justice,Emotional Response,Poverty,Social Bias

This paper provides an account of student teachers' responses to a simulation game about food scarcity and how the game served as a conversation starter regarding the influence of food scarcity on educational provisioning. The simulation game was utilised as part of a suite of activities during an educational excursion for first years in primary school teacher education. In this investigation data were generated via video recordings of the simulation game itself, summary notes of the key points of the discussion session during the game, and students' learning portfolios. Analysis of the various data sets indicate that student teachers' engaged with the game both viscerally and cerebrally, with the game providing a powerful concrete introduction to the issues of food scarcity and unequal distribution of resources. Most student teachers were able to relate the lessons learned from the game to the classroom and educational situation. In addition, I found that the simulation game as method can assist students in their activity of learning to look at education as an equity and justice issue.
At-Risk Student Teachers&apos; Attitudes and Aspirations as Learners and Teachers of Mathematics
Author: Moodley, Trevor
Date: 2015-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Preservice Teachers,Student Attitudes,Mathematics Instruction,Mathematics Teachers,Elementary School Mathematics,Freehand Drawing,Teacher Characteristics,Mathematics Anxiety,Influences,Writing Assignments,Elementary School Students,High School Students,Secondary School Students,Foreign Countries

This study explored foundation phase first-year student teachers' perceptions about mathematics. The focus on their attitudes towards mathematics in two roles -- (1) as learners of mathematics, based on their prior experiences at school and (2) as aspirant teachers of mathematics for children in the early grades. Data sources were students' drawings/collages as well as written interpretations and elaborations of the drawings/collages. The findings indicated that participants had generally negative attitudes towards the learning of mathematics. Factors such as the transition from primary to high school, teacher qualities and mathematics-related anxiety contributed to the shaping of their attitudes. It was encouraging to note that over half the participants expressed positive attitudes in their roles as future teachers, with all expressing the desire to provide better mathematics experiences to their future learners.
Transforming While Transferring: An Exploratory Study of How Transferability of Skills Is Key in the Transformation of Higher Education
Author: Bazana, Sandiso
Date: 2018-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Transfer of Training,Higher Education,Educational Change,Social Change,Racial Segregation,Foreign Countries,College Faculty,Age Differences,Teacher Retirement,Teacher Attitudes,Whites,Organizational Culture,Labor Legislation,Human Resources,Universities,Mentors,Faculty Development

The importance of skills within the transformation of higher education is a crucial factor that has been insufficiently considered. Transformation in terms of higher education forms a fundamental part of the post-apartheid South African society. This transformation movement seems to exclude the possible role and contributions of the older generation of academics. Using a social constructionist viewpoint, this qualitative study sought to bring to the debate of transformation of higher education the important question of skills transferability between older generation academics and the new generation. From interviewing five retired white academics, the study found that institutional culture and implementation of labour legislation through the Human Resources department by the university in question affect the transferability of skills and that proper programmes of voluntary mentorship should be put in place as to allow the growth of both the older generation and new generation academics. The use of new generation academics' perspectives could yield more results and findings that can further this area of study, as well as allow a more diverse and richer understanding of the perception of skills transferability within the transformation of higher education institutions. This further understanding for research is needed to emphasise the importance of knowledge production through the integration of both young academics' as well as older academics' perspectives. This is to be achieved by engaging with other universities and academics, so that a broader analysis of skills transferability within higher education can be understood.
A Mathematics Competence Test for Grade 1 Children Migrates from Germany to South Africa
Author: Fritz, Annemarie
Date: 2014-12-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Foreign Countries,Mathematics Tests,Grade 1,Elementary School Mathematics,Arithmetic,Mathematical Concepts,Young Children,Translation,Test Validity,African Languages

This article presents the translation and adaptation process of a mathematics test for the acquisition of key mathematical (arithmetic) concepts by children from four to eight years of age. The origin of this test was in Germany, whence it was sourced by researchers at the University of Johannesburg. A conceptual model of hierarchical mathematics competence development forms the theoretical foundation of the test. This notion of hierarchical competence was tested in a one-dimensional Rasch analysis, which confirmed the hierarchical structure of the test with five levels of ability. In the translation process, it was imperative to ascertain whether the items of the translation had retained the conceptual content of the original test and had been allocated to the same conceptual levels as in the original test. In a number of pilot studies with a total of 1 600 South African children, we focused on the items that had been allocated to a different level, aiming to find out whether this was the result of translation errors. In analyses of different samples, discussing and reflecting on the model fit, and especially on items that did not fit well, 'misfitting' items could mostly be attributed to translation difficulties and differences in the children's strategies, and not to a generally altered model. The final model was established after the rephrasing of critical items. This model has already been tested with 500 additional South African children. Results are presented and discussed, with the focus on the Sesotho test results.