Exploring the lexical and semantic access afforded by novice and experienced Namibian physical science teachers’ talk during electricity and magnetism lessons
- Authors: Muzambani, Efraim Hiamueze
- Date: 2022-10-14
- Subjects: Knowledge, Theory of , Education, Secondary Aims and objectives Namibia , Science Study and teaching (Secondary) Namibia , Systemic functional linguistics , Lexical density , Electricity Study and teaching (Secondary) Namibia , Magnetism Study and teaching (Secondary) Namibia
- Language: English
- Type: Academic theses , Master's theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/405346 , vital:70163
- Description: Challenges to learners’ meaning-making in the topic of electricity and magnetism contributes to underperformance in grade 10 Physical Science in Namibian schools. Teacher talk in content-based classrooms not only contributes to learners’ language development (Gibbons, 2003), but also facilitates meaning-making and cumulative knowledge-building (Halliday, 1999). However, it is possible that there are differences between the classrooms talk of novice and experienced Namibian Physical Science teachers. An understanding of differences between experienced and novice Namibian science teacher talk could inform teacher training and professional development and potentially help improve learners’ meaning-making in topics such as electricity and magnetism. However, no study could be found in the Namibian context which explored whether novice and experienced teacher talk afforded similar semantic and lexical access to meaning-making. This research gap provided a strong rationale for undertaking the study reported in this thesis. The study sought to investigate the extent to which novice and experienced grade 10 Namibian Physical Science teachers’ classroom talk provides semantic and lexical access to learners for the topic of electricity and magnetism. The research is informed by Legitimation Code Theory (LCT) and Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL). Research has shown that the two theories are complementary and can be used to characterize teachers’ pedagogical practices (Maton, 2014). A quantitative case study methodology was followed in this study with LCT’s semantic density and SFL’s lexical density as analytical tools to analyze the two teachers’ classroom talk. The results from a t-test for semantic density show that there is a significant difference in the means for “semantic density waving” criterion (t-value of -2.331; p-value for 2 tail test at 95% level of 0.0040) and for the “linking downward escalators or single references” criterion (t-value of 4.649; p-value for 2 tail test at 95% level of 0.001) of teacher talk by the teachers. The overall results for semantic density indicate that the experienced teacher affords better epistemological access through semantic waves than the novice teacher, whereas the novice teacher affords better epistemological access through semantic range and semantic flow. In terms of lexical density, both teachers afforded similar access, characterized by their talk veering towards the level of information density associated with written text. The study makes a methodological contribution to science education research through its characterization of novice and experienced teachers’ talk in terms of semantic waves and lexical density. This study also provides empirical insight into the differences between language use by novice and experienced Namibian Physical Science teachers, which can inform the work of educational institutions, advisory and inspectorate services in the ministry of education, and school managers. Relevant Namibian stakeholders are encouraged to consider including the topics of semantic density and lexical density, in continuous professional development programmes towards improving the meaning-making affordances of science teachers’ talk. , Thesis (MEd) -- Faculty of Education, Education, 2022
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- Date Issued: 2022-10-14
Gamification technology in teaching: Exploring how mathematics teachers make use of Kahoot! Gamification to facilitate learning of probability in classrooms
- Authors: Mbete, Ayanda
- Date: 2022-10-14
- Subjects: Gamification , Kahoot! , Mathematics Study and teaching (Elementary) South Africa Eastern Cape , Probabilities , Educational technology , Rural schools South Africa Eastern Cape , Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge , Cultural-historical activity theory
- Language: English
- Type: Academic theses , Master's theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/405311 , vital:70160
- Description: This study seeks to examine the use of Kahoot! as a gamification technology in practice with Grade six teachers to explore its use in supporting the learning of Probability in Mathematics in rural primary schools. Purposive sampling was adopted wherein nine Grade six mathematics teachers from four rural primary schools in Amathole East district were selected as participants of the study. In addition, to inform this qualitative case study, an interpretive paradigm was adopted. Data was collected using semi-questionnaires, semi-structured interviews, non-participant observations, workshop discussions and reflective journals. The TPACK by Mishra & Koehler (2009) and Vygotsky’s (1978) socio-cultural theory were employed as the lenses through which all the proceedings of the study were based. The key findings indicate that integrating Kahoot! gamification technology, in the ‘Probability’ lesson, has positive consequences such as bringing fun into the classroom, enhancing learner participation, prompt feedback and offering a learner-driven approach to learning as opposed to the conventional teaching strategies. The findings also revealed that enabling and constraining factors are associated with using Kahoot! in teaching: the ICT infrastructure, teachers’ competency levels and the environment in which teaching and learning occurs. This study concluded that the use of Kahoot enhances the learning of probability in rural under-resourced primary schools. This study recommended the integration of Kahoot gamification into the mathematics curriculum. , Thesis (MEd) -- Faculty of Education, Education, 2022
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- Date Issued: 2022-10-14
Human Development, the Capability Approach and the Mediating of Sustainable Rural Livelihoods: a case study of women’s empowerment through expansive learning in the Mzimvubu Catchment of the Eastern Cape province, South Africa
- Authors: Conde-Aller, Laura
- Date: 2022-10-14
- Subjects: Expansive learning , Social learning , Transformative learning , Capabilities approach (Social sciences) , Women's rights South Africa Mzimvubu River Watershed , Women Economic conditions , Women Social conditions , Sustainable agriculture South Africa Mzimvubu River Watershed
- Language: English
- Type: Academic theses , Doctoral theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/366236 , vital:65845 , DOI https://doi.org/10.21504/10962/366236
- Description: This study makes a contribution to the field of sustainable agricultural development and women empowerment in rural South Africa by examining the transformations derived from an expansive learning process with a women farmers group in terms of their food production capability expansion and empowerment as well as the well-being of their local catchment or landscape where their activity was situated. The study took place in the Lutengele villages along the upper reaches of the lower Mzimvubu Catchment near Port St Johns in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. Women in southern Africa are significant contributors to household livelihoods through their household food production practices and at the same time they are also one of the primary natural resource users in rural landscapes. In this case study, historical and contemporary ethnographic and situational data revealed disjuncture between existing practice and the fulfilment of women aspirations with regard to food security and social and ecological well-being at large. As a result, central to this study were the concepts of aspirations and capabilities and the role that these played in transformative learning processes via formative intervention research (after Engeström’s concept of expansive learning). Expansive learning emerges from Vygotsky’s early work on mediation of learning through language and culture, which gave raise to Cultural Historical Activity Theory (CHAT). Whereas the Capability Approach (CA) recognises that development interventions or initiatives should focus on “expanding the freedom that deprive people from enjoying their valued beings and doings” (Sen, 1999, p. 3), in other words, what people value or have reason to value. The Capability Approach coupled with CHAT deepens the contextual understanding of the agricultural activity system in light of the engendered power dynamics associated with women having access to productive resources, their culturally expected roles and responsibilities in the institution of their households, their families and the community at large, and most importantly, aspects of gerontocracy defined by their age and status in society. In addition, drawing on the Capability Approach as a lens to view agricultural development, social transformation and empowerment, provided the tools to conceptualise participants’ aspirations, their true value and the capabilities necessary for such aspirations to be realised in a context filled with socio-cultural and political power relations and dynamics faced especially by women. The first phase of the study set out to map the context in which the participants’ small-scale food production activity was situated, their aspirations relevant to sustainable agricultural livelihoods, food security, well-being and lastly, the main factors or contradictions inhibiting participants from attaining the aspired food production goals. During the initial phase of the expansive learning cycle I was able to address the first research question: What tensions and contradictions in aspiration-practice relationships shape household food security in the context of catchment management of the women farmers’ group or river forum in the Lutengele area? Twelve contradictions were identified from the historical and contemporary socio-cultural analysis of the home-based food production practices and agricultural activity in relation to the research participants’ envisaged aspirations, which under further scrutiny were thereafter considered by the participants as critical capabilities to pursue during the collective and transformative learning process in the second phase of the study. In the second phase of the study, a series of second stimuli were introduced in the form of conceptual and material tools and tasks with the aim to move participants along the expansive learning process. This led to the unfolding of the collectively defined Capability Learning Pathways for sustainable food production or expansion of their agricultural capability in the context of sustainability of the local micro-catchment or landscape. Through the various Change Laboratory workshops and supporting mini-cycles in the last stages of the formative interventionist research, participants’ learning and development was supported in a way that not only brought individuals together to co-design relevant solutions, strategies and working groups or committees, but also catalysed and amplified transformative agency and the expansion of food production capability, sustainable land use practices and ultimately empowerment. This answered the second and most important research question: Can, and if so, how can expansive social learning processes shape conversion factors for turning available resources into functionings that enhance household food security capabilities and ecological well-being? The methodology of expansive learning and formative interventionist research design intervention, with supporting mediating tools, has proven a positive intervention in the attainment of capabilities (or functionings) in relation to the participant’s aspired livelihoods and consequently improving their well-being as well as their ability to navigate through the various gendered power dynamics, especially for the young women participating in this study. The study proposes expansive learning as a suitable critical and transformative learning theory and methodology for the mediation of collective deliberations and the pursuit of capability development as charted by the learners’ collective and individual aspirations. This is a learning process that not only pursues the learners’ attainment of material and cognitive changes but also opens up new opportunities and most importantly, the freedom to exercise their agency no matter the circumstances they find themselves in – in other words, the freedom to aspire and to be, do and become what one values as instrumentally and intrinsically critical to live a life that they have reason to value. In sum, the unfolding of the expansive learning process happened at three levels: at the value clarification level in terms of human and non-human relationships and social relationality, the institutional level and the practices level. The study recommends further research on the suitability of expansive learning and Change Laboratories as a Capability Expansion Methodology involving human development and Capability Approach practitioners, particularly those with an interest in informal learning and community-based empowering initiatives. Additionally, further studies are also suggested for examining formative interventionist research as a participatory action research approach for capability development work in education and learning research and in different study fields and contexts. , Thesis (PhD) -- Faculty of Education, Education, 2022
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- Date Issued: 2022-10-14
Mentoring as social learning value creation in two South African environmental organisations: a social realist analysis
- Authors: Hiestermann, Michelle
- Date: 2022-10-14
- Subjects: Social realism , Social learning , Mentoring , Environmental education South Africa
- Language: English
- Type: Academic theses , Doctoral theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/366248 , vital:65846 , https://doi.org/10.21504/10962/366248
- Description: South Africa is facing overwhelming crises of educational quality, record rates of unemployment (especially amongst youth) and environmental issues and risks, further exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic. Environmental education research that addresses these challenges is critical to ensuring that future generations thrive in a warming climate. South Africa needs environmental leaders; we therefore need to understand and explore the possibilities of mentoring young professionals in environmental organisations in South Africa. Several initiatives have been developed to contribute to the mentoring of young professionals in South African environmental organisations. This study drew on a critical realist ontology, social realist meta-theory and domain specific theory on mentoring and evaluation to explore mentoring as a value creating proposition in two environmental organisations in South Africa that were part of the national Groen Sebenza youth employment creation programme which had a strong focus on mentoring. To strengthen conceptual analytical tools on mentoring, I undertook an immanent critique of domain specific mentoring theory to develop a more appropriate foundation for mentoring theory in the environmental sector that was not subject to the historical influence of human capital theory only (which has tended to dominate the field’s literature). I then developed in-depth understanding of mentoring in two case study contexts, namely a non-profit environmental organisation and an environmental consulting company, using qualitative research approaches that included contextual profiling, case study research and mirror data workshops. Analytically, I considered the case data drawing on the value creation evaluation framework of Wenger-Trayner and Wenger-Trayner (2014) which itself was developing as an analytical framework as the study developed. I strengthened the analytical framework with social realist interpretations drawing on Archer (1995). This offered me a way of developing an in-depth understanding of the factors which constrain or enable the value creation possibilities of mentoring, with a view to inform human capacity development initiatives that support mentoring in the environment sector. It was possible to explain the value creation possibilities of mentoring within two case study environmental organisations through considering mentoring as a social learning process of value creation and this overcame some of the shortfalls identified in other early learning theories as well as theories of mentoring. The research revealed how mentoring can provide a value creation social learning trajectory for unemployed youth. A social realist perspective explained how young professionals expanded their primary agency, through full participation in workplace communities of practice, to find their identity as corporate agents in the workplace with their mentors. In this research, Social Realist ontology, theory and methodology was able to achieve what Human Capital Theory could not and provided an account of the interplay of structure, culture and agency over time, through emergent properties and the separation of structure and agency. Thus, it was possible to avoid conflation and the limitation of theory of the present tense, with a deeper, ontologically robust explanation of mentoring as social learning and social change and a social realist orientation to human capacity development. South Africa has a history of oppression, inequality and injustice and requires social processes that are reflexive, critical, emancipatory and transformative. Therefore, this research required theory and approaches that could explain mentoring of unemployed youth, as a common good initiative for a more just and sustainable society. As shown in this study, a Social Realist approach can uncover the underlying generative mechanisms and make the implicit more explicit in research, policy and strategy, offering a robust alternative to the tenets of Human Capital Theory that have driven much mentoring research in South Africa and elsewhere to date. , Thesis (PhD) -- Faculty of Education, Education, 2022
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- Date Issued: 2022-10-14
Mobilising indigenous technologies of making oshikundu and uumboloto to motivate and enable sense making of the topic carbon dioxide by grade 8 rural school learners
- Authors: Nandjedi, Fredinard Nghinaounditala
- Date: 2022-10-14
- Subjects: Science Study and teaching (Secondary) Social aspects Namibia , Culturally relevant pedagogy Namibia , Ethnoscience Namibia , Carbon dioxide
- Language: English
- Type: Academic theses , Master's theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/405357 , vital:70164
- Description: Poor performance in Science has been noted in most rural schools and this has become a concern to education planners and implementers. Part of the failure is said to be caused by inadequate school resources, under-preparedness of teachers to teach Science, poor command of the Language of Learning and Teaching, negative attitudes that are accompanied by lack of insights into the value of Science, low self-efficacy, and poor-quality environments for learning Science. In this regard, literature has revealed that many Science teachers in Namibia do not consider learners’ local indigenous knowledge (IK) also known as indigenous technology to mediate learning. Yet, it is a requirement of the Namibian Science curriculum. I assume that this could be due in part to the fact that the Science curriculum is not explicit on how IK should be integrated into Science teaching. It is against this backdrop that this study sought to explore the opportunities IK integration into Science may offer in mediating learning and sense-making on the topic of carbon dioxide (CO2). Learners’ indigenous technological practices of making oshikundu and uumboloto were used as vehicles of learning. This qualitative case study is underpinned by the interpretive and indigenous research paradigms. Within the indigenous research paradigm, I focused on the Ubuntu perspective. This study was conducted at a rural under-resourced school in the Ohangwena region in Namibia. Thirty Grade 8 learners, one science teacher and two expert community members were involved as participants. Data were gathered using focus group interviews (sharing circles), group activities, participatory observations, and journal reflections. Data interpretation and analysis were done using Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory and Ogunniyi’s contiguity argumentative theory. A thematic approach to data analysis was adopted. That is, an inductive approach was employed whereby sub-themes were identified, and thereafter common sub-themes were combined into themes. The findings of this study revealed that the process of making oshikundu and uumboloto can be used to enable learners to make sense of the topic of CO2 and other related concepts. Furthermore, the study revealed that hands-on practical activities done with easily accessible resources which are related to learners’ indigenous technologies help learners learn Science easily. The study thus recommends that educators should use oshikundu and/or uumboloto to mediate learning of topics such as CO2. Science teachers should always try to tap into learners’ socio-cultural backgrounds in their lessons to enhance better understanding of Science concepts. , Thesis (MEd) -- Faculty of Education, Education, 2022
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- Date Issued: 2022-10-14
Mobilising the indigenous technology of making soap to mediate learning of saponification in organic chemistry
- Authors: Neporo, Johannes Kanyetu
- Date: 2022-10-14
- Subjects: Chemistry Study and teaching (Secondary) Social aspects Namibia , Culturally relevant pedagogy Namibia , Ethnoscience Namibia , Saponification , Ubuntu (Philosophy) , Pedagogical content knowledge
- Language: English
- Type: Academic theses , Master's theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/405368 , vital:70165
- Description: Scholars across the world are advocating for culturally responsive pedagogies that allow for the integration of indigenous knowledge (IK) in science teaching. This is in the hope of making science accessibleand relevant to learners from different social, economic and cultural backgrounds. Although the Namibian curriculum welcomes the integration of IK in teaching, it, however, does not stipulate how it should be implemented. It is against this backdrop that this interventionist study aimed to mobilise the indigenous technology of making soap to mediate the learning of saponification in organic chemistry. This study is underpinned by the interpretive and indigenous research paradigms. Within these paradigms, it employed a qualitative case study research design. The study was conducted in Walvis Bay in Namibia with four Grade 11 chemistry teachers, two expert community members and a critical friend who were purposively and conveniently sampled. Data were gathered using semi-structured interviews, semi-structured questionnaires, workshop discussions, participatory observation, stimulated recall interviews and journal reflections. Vygotsky’s Socio-Cultural Theory (SCT) and Shulman’s Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK) were used as theoretical frameworks. Within PCK, Mavhunga and Rollnick’s Topic-Specific Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TSPCK) served as an analytical framework. A thematic approach to data analysis was employed. That is, data were analysed inductively to come up with sub-themes. Thereafter, common sub-themes were combined to form themes. The findings of the study revealed that the Grade 11 chemistry teachers demonstrated positive attitudes toward the integration of IK in their teaching. However, they seemed not tohave pedagogical insights on how to do it. Despite this, they learnt, interacted and participated actively during the two expert community members’ presentation workshops on making soap. That subsequently enabled them to co-developan exemplar lesson plan on saponification that integrated IK. This study implies that there is a need for Chemistry teachers to be empowered on how to make science accessible and relevant to learners’ socio-cultural backgrounds. The study thus recommends that higher education institutions and educational authorities reform and amend the curriculum to cater for the integration of IK. The study further recommends that Chemistry teachers should tap into the cultural heritage of expert community members in mediating the learning of science concepts. Lastly, Chemistry teachers are encouraged to form professional learning communities to develop themselves professionally. , Thesis (MEd) -- Faculty of Education, Education, 2022
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- Date Issued: 2022-10-14
Teachers’ knowledge and practice in Grade 3 Group Guided Reading: a case study
- Authors: Kitsili, Ntsikohlanga Anthony
- Date: 2022-10-14
- Subjects: Reading (Elementary) , Guided reading , Group reading , Teaching practices
- Language: English
- Type: Academic theses , Master's theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/405270 , vital:70156
- Description: Group guided reading (GGR) was introduced as part of the Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement (CAPS) in 2012, but it appears that teachers are still experiencing great difficulty in teaching it (Hoadley 2018). Several interventions have been designed across South Africa to support teachers in no-fee schools to improve the teaching of reading. The evaluations of such interventions show that teachers receiving support such as coaching are able to master the procedural aspects of GGR but not the conceptual aspects, for example, teaching comprehension strategies and providing formative assessment (Fleisch & Dixon, 2019; Hoadley, 2017). The research reported in this thesis aimed to find out what kinds of knowledge are required to teach GGR and to what extent teachers enact this knowledge in their practice, using Shulman’s (1987) knowledge categories: subject content, pedagogical content and curriculum knowledge, general pedagogical knowledge and strategic knowledge. The research took the form of an interpretivist case study focusing on three Grade 3 teachers using GGR to teach reading in their classrooms. It was carried out in three no-fee, township schools where isiXhosa is the language of learning and teaching. Data was generated through observations, stimulated recall interviews, semi-structured interviews and document analysis. There are two policy documents that guide teachers’ practices in terms of how they should teach reading during GGR and that give clear guidance on what children should learn during GGR: the Foundation Phase CAPS and the National Framework for the Teaching of Reading in African Languages in the Foundation Phase. These documents were analysed using Shulman’s (1987) knowledge categories. Transcripts of teachers’ reflections on their GGR lessons during stimulated recall interviews were read hand in hand with transcripts of the GGR lessons that were video and audio recorded, and these were analysed using Shulman’s knowledge categories. The findings of the research are that teachers’ subject content knowledge is largely tacit; it is knowledge-in-practice. The teachers in the study seemed confident in showing rather than explaining what it is that they are doing and why they are doing it. All three teachers have mastered, to a large extent, the procedural aspects of GGR and some of the more conceptual aspects, for example some aspects of fluency, the teaching of decoding strategies and formative assessment. However, there was limited evidence of the teaching of comprehension strategies and the use of higher order questions, and assessment was not evident in the recorded lessons. , Ukufunda ngokwamaqela kusetyenziswe njengenxalenye yoluhlu lwezifundo kunye novavanyo mgaqo nkqubo lexwebhuCurriculum and Assessment Policy Statement (CAPS) lonyaka ka 2012, kodwa kubonakala ukuba ootitshala basatsala nzima ukusifundisa esisifundo (Hoadley 2018). Aliqela amaphulo aye ayilwa eMzantsi Afrika jikelele ngeenzame zokuxhasa ootitshala abafundisa kwizikolo zafelefele ukuba baphuhle kwisakhono sokufundisa ukufunda. Iziphumo zovavanyo zalamaphulo zibonakalise ukuba ootitshala abafumana inkxaso ekukuqeqeshwa baye bagqwesa ekufundiseni indlela ezilandelwayo ekufundiseni ukufunda ngokwamaqela, kodwa isengumcelamngeni ukufundisa izakhono eziphuhlisa ukufunda ngengqiqo nokuhlola inkqubela yabafundi ekufundeni, (Fleisch & Dixon, 2019; Hoadley, 2017). Ingxelo yophando lwale tyhisisi - belujole ekuboniseni ukuba loluphi ulwazi ekumele ootitshala babenalo ekufundiseni ukufunda ngokwamaqela, kwaye olulwazi lungancedisana njani nootitshala ekufundiseni ukufunda, ndisebenzisa iindidi zolwazi eziqulunqwe nguShulmna (1987): ulwazi ngomxholo wesosifundo, ulwazi ngeendlela ezifanelekileyo zokufundisa esosifundo kunye nolwazi oluqulathwe kuluhlu lwezifundo (curriculum), ulwazi oluphangaleleyo noluquka iindlela ezifanelekileyo zokufundisa, kunye nolwazi malunga namaqhinga athile ancedisana nokufundisa ukufunda ngendlela efanelekileyo. Oluphando lulandele indlela yokuphanda ebizwa ngokuba yi interpretivist case study ngokolwimi lwase mzini, eyona nto esisifundo besigqale kuyo ibi ngootitshala abathathu bebanga lesithathu abafundisa ukufunda kubantwana bengamaqela kumagumbi wabo okufundela. Oluphando luqhutyelwe kwizikolo ezintathu zafelefele (zikaRhulumente) elokishini apho isiXhosa ilulwimi olusetyenziswayo ekufundiseni nasekufundeni. Iinkukacha ziqokelelwe ngoku qwalasela okuqhubekayo egumbini lokufundela, nangokwenza uviwano ndlebe oluzindlela ezimbini: olokuqala lwenziwe emveni kwesifundo, ze olwesibini lwaqhutywa emveni kwesikolo apho utitshala uye wabukela umfanekiso oshicelelweyo wesifundo asiqhubileyo aze ahlatywe imibuzo ngesosifundo asijongileyo, kunye nangoku hlalutya okuqulathiweyo kumaxwebhu afana no CAPS. Mabini amaxwebhu aqulathe umgaqo nkqubo ochazela ootitshala ukuba mabakufundise njani ukufunda ngelixa abantwana befunda bengamaqela, kwaye angumkhombandlela ochaza gca okulindeleke abantwana bakufude ngexesha lokufunda bengamaqela: the Foundation Phase CAPS and the National Framework for the Teaching of Reading in African Languages in the Foundation Phase. Lamaxwebhu ahlalutywe ngokulandela iindidi zolwazi zika Shulmna (1987). Imibhalo ekhutshelweyo (transcripts) enika ingxelo ngokucingwa ngootitshala ngomsebenzi wabo wokufundisa abantwana bengamaqela ngexesha loviwano ndlebe ifundwe ngaxesha nye nemibhalo ekhutshelweyo yokufundiswa kwabantwana bengamaqela ebishicelelwe yangumboniso bhanyabhanya kunye nophulaphulekayo, oku kuye kwahlalutywa ngokusebenzisa iindidi zolwazi zika Shulman (1987). Iziphumo zophando zibonakalise ukuba ulwazi lootitshala malunga nomxholo wezifundo alubonakali ngokuthe gca, lubonakale ilulwazi olubonakala ngezenzo. Ootitshala abathathe inxaxheba kwesisifundo babonakale bezithembile ekuboniseni indlela abaqhuba ngayo, kodwa basilela ukucacisa ngokwamazwi abo into abayenzayo okanye unobangela wokwenza ngandlela ithile. Bonke ootisthala abathathu bagqwesile ekuboniseni ukuba bayayazi imigaqo ekufuneka ilandelwe xa kufundiswa isifunda samaqela ngamaqela, kwaye babonisile ukuba banalo ulwazi lokuphuhlisa izakhono zokufunda ngokutyibilika, nokufundisa abantwana amaqhinga athile abanowasebenzisa xabeguqula okufihlakele entethweni, kunye nendlela ezisesikweni zokuhlola. Nangona kunjalo nje ubungqina obubonisa ukuba abatitshala bathathu banaso isakhono sokufundisa amaqhinga okufunda ngengqiqo, kunye nokubuza imibuzo ekwinqanaba eliphezulu, kwaye namaxwebhu abonisa uhlolo luka titshala bunqongophele. , Thesis (MEd) -- Faculty of Education, Education, 2022
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- Date Issued: 2022-10-14
Teachers’ practice in developing visually impaired learners’ reading skills in the junior primary phase in northern Namibia
- Authors: Nuugonya, Elizabeth Nangula
- Date: 2022-10-14
- Subjects: Children with visual disabilities Education Namibia Oshana , Reading (Elementary) Namibia Oshana , Inclusive education Namibia Oshana , Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and Optional Protocol (2007 March 30) , Braille Study and teaching (Elementary) Namibia Oshana , Teachers of the blind Namibia Oshana
- Language: English
- Type: Academic theses , Master's theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/405379 , vital:70166
- Description: Namibia has adopted, ratified and followed several international policies on disability and inclusive education including the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD). Since 2014, the Namibian education system has been working towards the implementation of the Sector Policy on Inclusive Education to promote an education system that is accessible, inclusive, equitable and of good quality (Namibia. Ministry of Education, Arts and Culture: Sector Policy on Inclusive Education, 2013). The policy aims to address barriers faced by learners with disabilities and how teachers develop ways of teaching that respond to the individual differences. Reading in a second language tends to develop more slowly by visually impaired learners, although the Junior Primary Phase syllabus promotes equal opportunity for all learners to participate in reading equally irrespective of learners’ disabilities. Teachers should understand how to teach and accommodate learners who are visually impaired and all reading materials should be fit for purpose and support these learners appropriately. Thus, this study explores how Junior Primary teachers develop visually impaired learners’ reading skills to provide accessible education to them. Learning to read is challenging for most learners, but even more for learners who are visually impaired. Learning to read braille is a complex process, far more than reading print texts. This study seeks to examine how learners are taught to read using braille in a school for visually impaired learners in Namibia, Oshana region. The motivation for this research study was twofold - firstly, my interest in the development of reading skills with visually impaired learners was aroused by my teaching experience. Secondly, due to my realisation that the area was under-researched in Namibia; I wanted to fill the existing gap in the development of reading skills in braille and print. The study critically engaged teachers to help me obtain an understanding of how they develop reading instructions with visually impaired learners and the factors that enabled the development of braille literacy and the challenges that hampered the development of reading skills. The study took the qualitative case study approach underpinned by an interpretivist orientation. Data was collected using semi-structured observation during reading lessons and focus group interviews. The Theory of Practice Architectures (ToPA) was used as a lens to analyse the promoting and constraining factors in teaching visually impaired learners reading skills. The study found that teachers used different reading methods to promote the development of reading skills such as reading aloud, tactile methods and phonics. The study further noted that teachers mostly created their own reading materials due to the lack of reading materials and reading books printed in braille. Although learners were supported during reading, the challenge of developing reading skills with visually impaired learners remains a challenge. I hope that the findings from this research study strengthen the development of reading skills in all special schools and contribute to the creation of knowledge on the development of reading skills with visually impaired learners in Namibia. As a means to further support learners who experience visual impairments, this study recommends that more formative research studies on the notion of teachers’ practice in developing reading skills with visually impaired learners should be conducted to bring about change. , Thesis (MEd) -- Faculty of Education, Education, 2022
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- Date Issued: 2022-10-14
The development of teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) in the mediation of chemical equilibrium: A formative interventionist study
- Authors: Manamike, Tasara
- Date: 2022-10-14
- Subjects: Chemical equilibrium , Chemistry Study and teaching (Secondary) Nambia , Expansive learning , Career development Nambia , Professional learning communities Nambia , Pedagogical content knowledge , Cultural-historical activity theory
- Language: English
- Type: Academic theses , Master's theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/405300 , vital:70159
- Description: Persistent student errors in understanding chemical equilibrium as shown by poor student achievement in national examinations reflect student difficulties in learning and deficiencies in teaching methodologies. Studies which have been conducted in Namibia have explored the teaching of chemical equilibrium and revealed that teachers seem not to have adequate pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) for mediating chemical equilibrium and therefore there is a need for continuing professional development (CPD). However, it seems the CPD facilitators also find this topic difficult and are unsure of which methods are really effective owing to the disagreements among teachers and researchers. In addition, current CPD practices ostensibly fail to address the teachers’ needs because the facilitators have their own commitments and accountabilities and may ignore teachers’ contexts. It is against this backdrop that I conducted this formative interventionist study to improve teachers’ PCK for mediating chemical equilibrium through expansive learning (learning something that does not yet exist). A blend of the interpretivist and critical paradigm underpinned this study, which assumed a transactional epistemology. The qualitative case study research design was used to gather in-depth information about the multiple realities of the participants, bearing in mind that teaching is idiosyncratic, and the teaching approaches or strategies employed heavily depend on the contexts. Accordingly, the cultural historical activity theory was used to guide the teachers’ activities during the intervention for generating the data which were analysed using the topic-specific pedagogical content knowledge. The study revealed that the participants faced challenges in their teaching, namely: (i) students’ difficulties with comprehension and (ii) teachers’ instructional problems or deficiencies in instructional skills. The findings also revealed that the intervention enabled the participants to collectively transform their practices and therefore address the major challenges in their practices, that is, they expansively learnt how to effectively teach chemical equilibrium. , Thesis (MEd) -- Faculty of Education, Education, 2022
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2022-10-14
The use of lesson study to support grade 2 teachers in implementing differentiated instruction to develop learners’ reading comprehension skills
- Authors: Shipanga, Elizabeth Magano
- Date: 2022-10-14
- Subjects: Reading comprehension Study and teaching (Elementary) Namibia , Lesson study , Differentiated instruction , Teaching Social aspects Namibia
- Language: English
- Type: Academic theses , Master's theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/405390 , vital:70167
- Description: Research has found that learners in Namibia have poor reading comprehension (UNESCO, 2017). The Ministry of Education Arts and Culture (MoEAC) is concerned that teachers do not have the required pedagogical content knowledge to teach reading, and particularly reading comprehension in English Second Language. In addition, the MoEAC (2015) advocates for Differentiated Instruction (DI) to accommodate the needs of all learners in the classroom. Despite, numerous Continuous Professional Development programs, there has not been much change in the way teachers teach reading. The Lesson Study (LS) approach is viewed as a means to support teachers’ professional development. It provides teachers with the agency to take responsibility for their own professional development. It is against this background that an interpretivist action research was utilised to ascertain how LS can be used to support Grade 2 teachers in implementing DI to develop learners’ reading comprehension skill. This study asked the question: How can Lesson Study be used to support Grade 2 teachers in implementing Differentiated Instruction to develop the learners’ reading comprehension? Data was generated through observations, document analysis and interviews. The Theory of Practice Architectures was used to analyse data. As teachers we began this study with knowledge of the goals and terminology of DI but lacked the competence to implement it. The LS process used in the study enhanced teamwork as we planned, taught, observed each other, and reflected on the lessons taught during the intervention. We shared diverse insights in a supportive environment. Despite still novices with LS and DI we worked on redesigning lessons to become more intentional in catering for the needs of all learners in developing their reading comprehension in English Second Language. The emerging evidence from this and other studies is that LS is a very useful vehicle for Continuous Professional Development (CPD), but it is time consuming and in this study planning and reflecting on the lessons had to occur after hours. , Thesis (MEd) -- Faculty of Education, Education, 2022
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2022-10-14
An investigation of how a visual teaching approach can possibly address issues of mathematics anxiety at a selected school in the Oshikoto region of Namibia
- Authors: Ngonga, Daniel Nghifikepunye
- Date: 2022-04-08
- Subjects: Visual learning Namibia , Math anxiety Namibia , Mathematics Study and teaching Namibia , After-school programs Namibia , Mathematics Study and teaching Activity programs
- Language: English
- Type: Academic theses , Master's theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/290637 , vital:56770
- Description: This Namibian case study aimed to explore a visual teaching approach (VTA) used by three selected teachers to address issues of mathematics anxiety (MA). The three teachers took part in an intervention program that was looking at how a VTA could be grown in the context of an after-school club (ASC) at my school. The selected teachers were the senior primary teachers at my school. The focus of the research was on how they taught mathematics using visuals after participating in an intervention programme. Their VTA made use of manipulatives, visuals, and concrete materials. The learners of the participating teachers completed a big MA pre-test, small MA tests, and a big MA post-test to determine their levels of MA as the teaching programme unfolded. The study hoped to create awareness amongst teachers and education researchers about the significant use of a VTA in the teaching and learning of mathematics to address issues of MA among the learners. It aimed to answer three research questions. One was on teachers’ use of a VTA in the context of an ASC; the second one was on comparisons of learners’ MA big pre and post-tests to detect any change of MA, and the last was on the enabling and constraining factors encountered when using a VTA. The main argument was that a VTA can encourage learners to be more confident and less anxious about doing mathematics. This study was framed by a constructivist perspective and its design and methodology were underpinned by an interpretive paradigm. This mixed-method research study employed video-recorded observations and stimulated recall interviews, learners’ MA test results, and the teachers’ focus group interviews as the means of collecting data. To generate rich data and support validity, four lessons per selected teacher were observed and video recorded; 54 learners completed the MA tests of 16 questions, and three teachers answered seven questions each in the focus group interview (FGI) after the stimulus recall interviews (SRI) which were done immediately after the lesson presentations. The study found that the participating teachers incorporated a variety of visuals into their lessons to make the mathematics fun, inspiring, visible, hands-on, and activity-oriented. They engaged the learners and also found that the use of visuals motivated learners and reduced their MA. , Thesis (MED) -- Faculty of Education, Education, 2022
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2022-04-08
Chinese character learning with the aid of an ICT website among Mandarin Second Additional Language learners in South Africa: a case study
- Authors: Fu, Shuying
- Date: 2022-04-08
- Subjects: Mandarin dialects Study and teaching (Secondary) South Africa , Mandarin dialects Computer-assisted instruction for English speakers , Second language acquisition , Chinese characters , Information technology South Africa , Educational technology South Africa , Arch Chinese
- Language: English
- Type: Academic theses , Master's theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/263590 , vital:53641
- Description: The teaching of Mandarin as a Second Additional Language (SAL) in South African schools was only introduced in 2016. The year 2018 saw the first Mandarin as SAL National Senior Certificate examination. Little research has been done on the teaching and learning of Mandarin as a SAL subject at the high school level in South Africa. Character learning and teaching are some of the most challenging aspects of this language teaching and learning. This research sought to investigate how beginner Mandarin SAL learners can be supported by a particular Information Communication Technology (ICT) website, www.archchinese.com (Arch Chinese), in their character learning. Learners’ ability to memorise Chinese characters is of utmost importance for their success in this language learning, especially for matriculants. To support the main research goal, this study set out to investigate the requirements for Chinese character learning, the role the website Arch Chinese plays in learners’ character learning and Mandarin SAL learners’ experience of using Arch Chinese as a learning tool. This research was conducted in the form of a case study within the interpretative paradigm. It adopted a questionnaire and document analysis for data collection to gain insight into the research topic. To get answers to the research questions posed above, the study analysed the Curriculum Assessment Policy Statement (CAPS) Mandarin SAL documents from Grade 4–12, the Independent Examination Board (IEB) Mandarin Subject Assessment Guidelines (SAGs), and a textbook for beginners, Learn Chinese with me: Student’s book 1 in relation to character learning. The features and functions of the website, Arch Chinese, were also evaluated and Mandarin SAL learners’ answers to a questionnaire on their use of the website Arch Chinese were analysed. The study found that character teaching and learning has not been given enough attention in the curriculum. It was only covered in the Intermediate Phase but was seldom mentioned in the Senior and Further Education and Training Phases in the curriculum. The CAPS Mandarin SAL documents do not consider the special characteristics of the Mandarin language, as this curriculum was based on the CAPS English Generic SAL document. As a result, the assessment requirements on writing (character count requirement in particular) were not realistic. The teaching approaches promoted in the curriculum and the teaching time do not correspond well with the teaching and learning of this language. Moreover, this study found that there was no vocabulary list prescribed in the curriculum and therefore a gap exists between the curriculum on paper and the curriculum in practice. The analysis of the IEB SAGs found that the assessments were suitable for the level of Mandarin SAL learners. This is because the IEB considered the characteristics of the Mandarin language, which is non-cognate, to the alphabet-based languages that respondents in this research spoke or were familiar with. At the same time, the analysis of the website and the learners’ questionnaire found that learners held a positive attitude towards their use of the website and that it proved to help facilitate Mandarin SAL learners in their character learning. This study ends with recommendations for teachers, policy makers, the IEB, and character-learning websites. , Thesis (MEd) -- Faculty of Education, Education, 2022
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2022-04-08
English additional language student teachers’ development of oral strategic competence and confidence
- Authors: Meyers, Rozanne Elanore
- Date: 2022-04-08
- Subjects: Student teaching South Africa , Communicative competence South Africa , Oral communication , Native language and education , Language arts , Verbal ability , Multilingual education
- Language: English
- Type: Academic theses , Master's theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/263613 , vital:53643
- Description: This case study sought to understand how oral strategic and discourse competence and confidence developed in student teachers using English, their additional language, firstly as a tool of learning and secondly, as a medium of instruction in education environments. Within the broad qualitative approach an interpretive framework was adopted using multiple data collection tools. This was in order to privilege detailed accounts of participants’ experiences. Namely, unstructured interviews, drawings, observational checklists, and selfassessment questionnaires. Participants’ oral strategic and discourse competence were assessed using an observation checklist as they presented micro-teaching lessons. Additionally, participants completed a self-assessment questionnaire, reflecting on their oral competence after conducting their micro-teaching lessons. These perceptions were confirmed through a discussion of drawings that illustrated how they perceived themselves during lectures when they had to use English during oral interaction with lecturers and fellow students. Finally, unstructured interviews were conducted after participants completed their micro-teaching lessons and after participants had completed their drawings. The raw data from the four tools were analysed using a thematic approach. Main themes and categories were analysed and discussed to provide answers to the research questions. Data correlated the attitude of participants towards English and their level of oral confidence and competence. The main findings were that students were motivated to develop their oral English competence because they believed it was an important skill for teachers to possess. This motivation also proved to be a leading factor in participants’ competence despite the negative emotions they identified during spoken exchanges. Furthermore, the analysis found that collaborating with fellow students in making meaning of oral communication during lectures, increased students’ oral competence and their confidence because they were communicating in smaller groups. However, in certain situations, collaborating with students also decreased their confidence. Findings indicated that reciprocal facial expressions and the body language of those who engaged orally with the student teachers, increased their oral confidence as it served as an indication to them that they were understood. Based on these findings, recommendations are made regarding interactions during lectures for teacher training programmes in Higher Education in South Africa, for lecturers and lecturing practices, and curriculum designers in the South African Department of Education. , Thesis (MEd) -- Faculty of Education, Education, 2022
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2022-04-08
The transformative potential of intersecting arts-based inquiry and environmental learning in urban South Africa: a focus on socio-ecological water pedagogies
- Authors: James, Anna Katharine
- Date: 2022-04-08
- Subjects: Environmental education South Africa , Water conservation Study and teaching South Africa , Art in environmental education South Africa , Social learning South Africa , Educational sociology South Africa , Water-supply Social aspects South Africa , Critical realism , Socio-ecological education
- Language: English
- Type: Academic theses , Doctoral theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/290660 , vital:56772 , DOI 10.21504/10962/290660
- Description: In this study I explore and explain transformative potential in arts-based environmental learning with a focus on water pedagogy. The study took place over a period of four years, where approximately 40 school pupils between the ages of 10 and 17 years-old were engaged in participatory arts-based inquiries into water located across unequal neighbourhoods in Cape Town, South Africa. Educators, school learners, citizens and decision-makers hold different historical, cultural, political and spiritual perspectives on water. These play a role in shaping what is termed in this research the ‘hydro-social cycle’. Yet, due to dominant ideas of what counts as knowing and truth, educators in educational settings struggle to account for the complexity of water, limiting educational encounters to a partial knowing leading mostly to limited unimaginative framings of problems and solutions. My focus on transformative potential in learning is derived from a concern for how environmental education encounters and the sense-making they enable, are infused by socio-economic, political, and historical elements, specifically colonialism, capitalism, and white supremacist racism. The connections between the multiple layers of capitalist crisis and the ever-urgent environmental crisis are not adequately made in mainstream forms of water education. The research explores how arts-based pedagogy could enable a productive meeting of critical environmental education with ecological literacies. Within this positioning, transformative potential considers how educational engagements position questions about water within the social life of participants/learners and inform learning that leads to fuller and more nuanced greater knowledge. Theoretically, I work with an interrogation of critical education theory, underlaboured by critical realism which enabled me to rigorously consider how claims to knowing are shaped by their accompanying assumptions of what is real. Drawing on recent debates in critical education theory, I resist the notion of critique as ideology and engage instead in the craftsmanship of contextual and responsive inquiry practice. This has enabled me to articulate processes and relationships in water education encounters with meaningful understandings of the effects of simultaneous crises rooted in racial capitalism and environmental crisis. My methodological approach is arts-based educational research with a directive to reflect upon educational encounters in an integrated way. It includes two parts informing the facilitation and analysis of open-ended learning processes. One component was arts-based inquiry practice developed for exploring complexity, drawing on the thinking of Norris (2009, 2011) and Finley (2016, 2017). The second part holds reflective space for these encounters guided by the practice of pedagogical narration inspired by the Reggio Amelia approach, demonstrated by Pacini-Ketchabaw, Nxumalo, Kocher, Elliot and Sanchez (2014). Clarifying the intellectual work of a responsive educator-researcher, pedagogical narration brings multiple theoretical lenses into conversation with emergent dimensions of educational process. In practice, in order to transgress the dominance of colonial white supremacist knowledge frames of water, I needed to be curious, to be confounded, to expect the unexpected in the educational encounters with participants and this mirroring of practice was emulated by the participants as they followed their own questions about water in Mzansi (South Africa). In our work together we came up against assumptions we had previously not questioned as individuals. Together we explored the implications of this by, for example, questioning who is responsible for saving water. These explorations required bringing together science knowledge and everyday knowledge at multiple scales: the household, catchment, government and global. It required us to be critical of how language and images are mobilized in public communication and school curriculums; for example, representations of water are infused with history and power in a way that impacts how we know and teach about water. The transformative potential of this pedagogical space is generated through acts of creative expression which are seen as acts of absenting absence, for example exhibiting through play how water use in the household interconnects with gender and age relationships. As such, creative expression through multiple mediums or more-than-text enables a deeper understanding of water as well as openings for interdisciplinary engagement with learning about water. My research found that in bringing together the contributions of critical education and environmental education in practice, two shifts are needed: environmental educators need to view ecological literacy as inseparable from the social and political. The knowledge that is shared about water in the classroom has social and political implications. On the other hand, critical educators need to better locate justice concerns in the material and ecological world at scale. Arts-based inquiry, as a kind of scaffolding for pedagogical process, has the potential to enable these shifts by opening up fixed analytical frames. Making these shifts requires a reflective practice on the part of the educator to navigate the inherited blind spots in environmental learning and critical education, such as dualities. One way to do this is for the educator to identify absences, as articulated in the Critical Realist tradition, and consider how these absences might be absented. This differs from a simplistic process of critique in the possibilities it opens up for collaboration between different schools of thought rather than further polarisation and alienation between educators and knowledge keepers on social ecologies. These insights have relevance for many sites of environmental education practice, such as natural science lecturers, school teachers or community activists. It is knowledge-learning work emergent from and responsive to complex ecological crisis, which requires everyone to rethink and open up to new ways of being, seeing and doing around these issues. The transformative potential of this work is that the thinking and transforming at all scales can be catalysed and grounded through the arts based educational encounters with the participants. , Thesis (PhD) -- Faculty of Education, Education, 2022
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2022-04-08
The use of smartphones and visualisation processes for conceptual understanding of mensuration: a case study of the Mathcitymap Project in Namibia
- Authors: Shimakeleni, Liina
- Date: 2022-04-08
- Subjects: Mathematics Study and teaching (Secondary) Namibia Oshana , Smartphones , Visual learning , Measurement , Concept learning , MathCityMap (MCM) project
- Language: English
- Type: Academic theses , Master's theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/290649 , vital:56771
- Description: The aim of this study was to investigate and analyse the potential use of smartphones as visualisation tools by learners to enhance conceptual understanding through mathematics trails developed using the MathCityMap (MCM) project. This research study is part of the VIPROmaths project which seeks to research the effective use of visualisation processes in mathematics classrooms in South Africa, Namibia, Zambia, Switzerland and Germany. This study adopted a case of twelve purposively selected Grade 9 learners from a school in the Eheke circuit of the Oshana region, Namibia. This study was framed within a social constructivist perspective and sought to investigate visualisation processes as well as conceptual understanding of learners as they conceptualised the MCM tasks in new, outdoor and collaborative learning situations. The MCM app was installed on selected learners’ smartphones to access and to walk the MCM trails located in various places in the schoolyard. Three MCM trails based on three key themes of mensuration (perimeter, area and volume) were created. Each consisted of four tasks that were sourced and developed in line with the Grade 9 Namibian mathematics syllabus. This study is oriented in an interpretive paradigm and employed video-recorded observations and focus group interviews as qualitative data collection methods. Data collected were analysed first using the themes developed from Ho’s (2010) work on visualisation processes and Kilpatrick, Swafford, and Findell’s (2001) conceptual understanding. During analysis, some themes emerged from the data and were considered. Findings from this study revealed that smartphones afforded learners ample opportunities to enhance the visualisation processes that they went through as they learned the concepts of measurement. In addition to this, some learners were initially pessimistic regarding the use of smartphones for learning purposes. This study recommends that resources such as MCM be effectively be used in formal school settings. The learning of measurement can be advanced in outdoor settings where learners have physical and spatial access to the learning content. Smartphone technology can be used as an additional tool to integrate Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in learning mathematics within the Namibian context. , Thesis (MED) -- Faculty of Education, Education, 2022
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2022-04-08
Towards the Common Good: An expansive post-abyssal (Re)stor(y)ing of the epistemic cultures of the citizen sciences
- Authors: Vallabh, Priya
- Date: 2022-04-08
- Subjects: Science Citizen participation , Decolonization , Social epistemology , Hegemony , Common good , Traditional ecological knowledge , Ethnoscience
- Language: English
- Type: Academic theses , Doctoral theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/290671 , vital:56773 , DOI 10.21504/10962/290671
- Description: In this study I explore and explain transformatiThe citizen sciences convene complex and reflexive ecologies of knowledges in response to a range of social-ecological risks. Their epistemic cultures seem to be assembled in ways which increase potential mobilisation of the common knowledges being produced, thereby producing knowledges in forms that are more strongly aligned with a range of implementation strategies. However, much of such processes of knowledge production have been ‘cleaned out’ of official accounts through scientifically hegemonic systems of legitimation, deepening hegemonically-entrenched systems of epistemic, contributory and distributive injustices, and undermining the potential for stronger enactments of participatory and radical democracies. The engagement of sociologies of absences and emergences in this study evidence these epistemic insights, thereby evidencing an expansive post-abyssal (re)stor(y)ing of the citizen sciences. Through this research, I consider knowledge production as ‘commoning', towards the constitution of the common good. To date, most accounts of knowledge production within citizen science projects primarily focus on scientific processes of knowledge production and legitimation. Such accounts neglect the ecologies of diverse knowledges through which knowledge is being collaboratively produced, the forms of learning that occur, or the ways in which such ecologies are mobilised in response to specific socialecological risks. To better understand the ways in which citizen science projects build risk-responsive common knowledge, I bring a focus to the diversity of epistemic cultures convened, speaking to this gap. My primary research question is: How do the epistemic cultures within citizen science projects enable commoning in response to social-ecological risk? To begin, I establish a particular vantage point from which the remainder of the thesis is launched, one which centres as the primary interest of knowledge production, an interest in social-ecological justice and the constitution of the common good. From this vantage point, knowledge co-production and learning can be viewed as acts of commoning, which themselves constitute common goods. I draw on the work of Karin Knorr Cetina to conceptualise and frame notions of epistemic cultures and their epistemic features. Expanding notions of epistemic cultures from a post-abyssal perspective, I draw on the work of Bruno Latour and Boaventura de Sousa Santos. Latour’s distinctions between the production of ‘matters of fact’ and ‘matters of concern’ provide a way to challenge hegemonic systems of scientific knowledge production, while preserving the potential emergence of multiplicity in the context of evolving risk, thereby enabling a greater degree of situated reflexivity. Santos argues for the reclamation of all ways of knowing, including but not limited to scientific ways of knowing the world. He argues that other forms of knowledge are produced as nonexistent, and that they might be reclaimed through engaging sociologies of absences and emergences. Both authors enable a stronger analysis of knowledge production in terms of its ability to intervene into context in response to manifest risks. These three theoretical approaches are convened into an analytical framework for the study. To enact sociologies of absences and emergences, I engage two forms of immanent critique, complemented by an epistemic mapping of 50 South African citizen science projects, and an analysis of three illustrative case studies. The first critique is one of produced nonexistence, through which I consider three aspects of the general knowledge cultures within which the epistemic cultures of citizen science projects are situated. This critique makes evident the ways in which the ontological and related conceptual structures of hegemonic scientific knowledge production actively produce as nonexistent, other onto-epistemic contributions to knowledge production in response to social-ecological risks. The second critique reviews the field of peer-reviewed literature through a reading of presence and absence, with a focus on the articulation of epistemic cultures. Predictably, a key finding is that this form of scientific reporting primarily foregrounds legitimated scientifically processed knowledge, while once again producing as nonexistent, other forms of knowledges. However, there is evidence of increasing accounts of citizen science which recognise both a diversity of knowledge contributions, and epistemic, contributory and distributive justice issues as regards hegemonic forms of reporting. The epistemic mapping evidences a highly diversified field of citizen sciences, whose epistemic cultures are convened to produce distinct forms of scientifically-informed knowledges in response to diverse contexts, scales and notions of risk. The three illustrative case studies engage sociologies of absences and emergences, with particular focus on articulating the ecologies of knowledges evidenced in project documentation, including both official and unofficial accounts of epistemic activity. This analysis highlights the significant contributions of diverse forms of knowledges, including scientific, situated, embodied, governance, indigenous, spiritual and relational knowledges, and the ways in which these knowledge are convened to respond to specific configurations of risk. It once again highlights issues of epistemic, contributory and distributive justice, and makes evident the need for stronger integrity in processes of producing and reporting common knowledges. The case studies also illustrate the increased effectiveness of leveraging an ecology of knowledges (in contrast to a monoculture of scientific knowledge) in response to situated risks, including how such ecologies have a tendency to be generative and enable multiple forms of intervention into structures and applied contexts of intervention. In response to the collective research findings, a think-piece on rigour-as-integrity is offered as a contribution to commoning, in response to social-ecological risk. The piece draws together a postabyssal system of rigour intended to strengthen knowledge production in ways which actively centre forms of justice and commoning. ve potential in arts-based environmental learning with a focus on water pedagogy. The study took place over a period of four years, where approximately 40 school pupils between the ages of 10 and 17 years-old were engaged in participatory arts-based inquiries into water located across unequal neighbourhoods in Cape Town, South Africa. Educators, school learners, citizens and decision-makers hold different historical, cultural, political and spiritual perspectives on water. These play a role in shaping what is termed in this research the ‘hydro-social cycle’. Yet, due to dominant ideas of what counts as knowing and truth, educators in educational settings struggle to account for the complexity of water, limiting educational encounters to a partial knowing leading mostly to limited unimaginative framings of problems and solutions. My focus on transformative potential in learning is derived from a concern for how environmental education encounters and the sense-making they enable, are infused by socio-economic, political, and historical elements, specifically colonialism, capitalism, and white supremacist racism. The connections between the multiple layers of capitalist crisis and the ever-urgent environmental crisis are not adequately made in mainstream forms of water education. The research explores how arts-based pedagogy could enable a productive meeting of critical environmental education with ecological literacies. Within this positioning, transformative potential considers how educational engagements position questions about water within the social life of participants/learners and inform learning that leads to fuller and more nuanced greater knowledge. Theoretically, I work with an interrogation of critical education theory, underlaboured by critical realism which enabled me to rigorously consider how claims to knowing are shaped by their accompanying assumptions of what is real. Drawing on recent debates in critical education theory, I resist the notion of critique as ideology and engage instead in the craftsmanship of contextual and responsive inquiry practice. This has enabled me to articulate processes and relationships in water education encounters with meaningful understandings of the effects of simultaneous crises rooted in racial capitalism and environmental crisis. My methodological approach is arts-based educational research with a directive to reflect upon educational encounters in an integrated way. It includes two parts informing the facilitation and analysis of open-ended learning processes. One component was arts-based inquiry practice developed for exploring complexity, drawing on the thinking of Norris (2009, 2011) and Finley (2016, 2017). The second part holds reflective space for these encounters guided by the practice of pedagogical narration inspired by the Reggio Amelia approach, demonstrated by Pacini-Ketchabaw, Nxumalo, Kocher, Elliot and Sanchez (2014). Clarifying the intellectual work of a responsive educator-researcher, pedagogical narration brings multiple theoretical lenses into conversation with emergent dimensions of educational process. In practice, in order to transgress the dominance of colonial white supremacist knowledge frames of water, I needed to be curious, to be confounded, to expect the unexpected in the educational encounters with participants and this mirroring of practice was emulated by the participants as they followed their own questions about water in Mzansi (South Africa). In our work together we came up against assumptions we had previously not questioned as individuals. Together we explored the implications of this by, for example, questioning who is responsible for saving water. These explorations required bringing together science knowledge and everyday knowledge at multiple scales: the household, catchment, government and global. It required us to be critical of how language and images are mobilized in public communication and school curriculums; for example, representations of water are infused with history and power in a way that impacts how we know and teach about water. The transformative potential of this pedagogical space is generated through acts of creative expression which are seen as acts of absenting absence, for example exhibiting through play how water use in the household interconnects with gender and age relationships. As such, creative expression through multiple mediums or more-than-text enables a deeper understanding of water as well as openings for interdisciplinary engagement with learning about water. My research found that in bringing together the contributions of critical education and environmental education in practice, two shifts are needed: environmental educators need to view ecological literacy as inseparable from the social and political. The knowledge that is shared about water in the classroom has social and political implications. On the other hand, critical educators need to better locate justice concerns in the material and ecological world at scale. Arts-based inquiry, as a kind of scaffolding for pedagogical process, has the potential to enable these shifts by opening up fixed analytical frames. Making these shifts requires a reflective practice on the part of the educator to navigate the inherited blind spots in environmental learning and critical education, such as dualities. One way to do this is for the educator to identify absences, as articulated in the Critical Realist tradition, and consider how these absences might be absented. This differs from a simplistic process of critique in the possibilities it opens up for collaboration between different schools of thought rather than further polarisation and alienation between educators and knowledge keepers on social ecologies. These insights have relevance for many sites of environmental education practice, such as natural science lecturers, school teachers or community activists. It is knowledge-learning work emergent from and responsive to complex ecological crisis, which requires everyone to rethink and open up to new ways of being, seeing and doing around these issues. The transformative potential of this work is that the thinking and transforming at all scales can be catalysed and grounded through the arts based educational encounters with the participants. , Thesis (PhD) -- Faculty of Education, Education, 2022
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2022-04-08
Visualisation processes in teaching patterns and their generalisation: perceptions and experiences from senior phase mathematics teachers
- Authors: Chatima, Simon
- Date: 2022-04-08
- Subjects: Visual learning South Africa Eastern Cape , Mathematics Study and teaching (Secondary) South Africa Eastern Cape , Mathematics teachers South Africa Eastern Cape Attitudes , Sequences (Mathematics) Study and teaching (Secondary) South Africa Eastern Cape , Constructivism (Education) South Africa Eastern Cape , Mathematics teachers In-service training South Africa Eastern Cape , VIPRO MATHS Project
- Language: English
- Type: Master's thesis , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/232936 , vital:50039
- Description: This study investigated how senior phase mathematics teachers used visualisation approaches to teach patterns and their generalisation as a result of an intervention programme. This project is an integral component of the VIPRO MATHS Project and one of a number of post-graduate research projects which has a particular focus on visualisation processes in mathematics education in the Southern African region. This case study of Senior Phase mathematics teachers in the Chris Hani West District (CHW) in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa used a social constructivist theory. The study is grounded within an interpretive paradigm explanatory qualitative method design. It surveyed thirty-seven Senior Phase mathematics teachers from schools in the CHW district to get an idea of how teachers teach patterns and their generalisation, prior to an intervention process. After the survey, nine teachers were purposively selected to take part in an intervention programme. They were then observed (teaching) and interviewed to get their perceptions about what factors enable and/or constrain the teaching of patterns and their generalisation when visualisation approaches were used. The data from the survey questionnaire responses, the lesson observations and the interviews were analysed qualitatively. The findings from the survey questionnaire responses revealed that teachers in CHW district value the use of visualisation approaches, although they used visuals to teach patterns in a way that lacked depth, skill and rigor prior to the intervention. Challenges such as difficulty in keeping abreast with the prescribed syllabus, the lack of resources, time constraints, and the limited knowledge of algebra learners have for successfully transferring pictorial representations to symbolic presentations, emerged from the survey data. This necessitated the need for an intervention which focused on the use of a variety of visual strategies and tools to teach patterns and their generalisation effectively. Data from lesson observations showed that all observed participant teachers used visuals to generate image- related questions and created platforms for lively classroom discussions. The teachers used the generated questions to build on learners’ prior knowledge and to promote learner understanding of pattern dynamics that stem from pictorial representations. The data from the interviews revealed that teachers’ perceptions had drastically changed after the intervention. This was because they were now equipped and empowered to effectively make use of visual strategies that enabled them to: build on learners’ prior knowledge, to manipulate visuals for the purpose of prompting learning, develop cognitive perception in learners, cultivate learner innovation and originality and enhance problem solving techniques. This study concludes that the use of visuals enhanced conceptual teaching of patterns and their generalisation in the observed participants. This has the potential to provide mathematics education researchers and curriculum developers with a strong basis to include visualisation processes and strategies into the design of policy documents and to initiate further research efforts. The implications for the teachers are that learners need to be taught ways to create and interpret visual representations in order to understand the dynamics of transferring a pictorial pattern to its resultant symbolic representation expressing pattern regularity. It is also hoped that the results of this study will be utilised by mathematics subject advisers and teacher training institutions to improve the teaching of patterns and their generalisation. , Thesis (MEd) -- Faculty of Education, Education, 2022
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- Date Issued: 2022-04-08
The mechanisms conditioning doctoral supervision development in public universities across South Africa
- Authors: Motshoane, Puleng Lorraine
- Date: 2022-04
- Subjects: Doctoral students South Africa , Graduate students Supervision of South Africa , Agent (Philosophy) , Public universities and colleges South Africa , Supervisors Training of South Africa , Supervision South Africa , Mentoring in education South Africa
- Language: English
- Type: Doctoral thesis , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/232305 , vital:49980 , DOI 10.21504/10962/232305
- Description: This study offers a social realist account of how South African public institutions develop emerging supervisors. The study addresses the need for supervision development across South African public higher education universities. The purpose of the study was to answer the question “What mechanisms condition the development and support of emerging doctoral supervisors across South African public universities?” To examine this question, analytical dualism was used to separate the roles of the ‘people’ (agents) from the ‘parts’ (structure and culture) to examine their interplay. The study was qualitative, and the data was generated through documents, an online survey, and semi-structured interviews. One hundred and eighty-six participants responded to the survey and fifty-four people were interviewed. The participants came from twenty of the twenty-six public higher education universities and represent a large range of disciplines. The study findings revealed that emerging supervisors were often simply ‘thrown into the deep-end’ as they had to work out how to supervise by learning from their students and using the experience gained while they were being supervised. This was experienced as highly problematic by the participants who shared this understanding. Secondly, the findings suggest that where there were developmental events in place, some were not well received. For example where those providing the training were not regarded as credible because they lacked the supervision experience or because the interventions were seen to be too ad hoc and generic. There were calls for more discipline-specific interventions and collaborative spaces where emerging supervisors could engage with experienced supervisors rather than being instructed in a generic best-practice of ‘how to supervise’. The findings indicated that the lines between co-supervision and mentoring were often blurred, and both were used as another form of supervision development. Such relationships provided a useful means for emerging supervisors to come to understand the complex pedagogy of postgraduate supervision but were at times constrained by power imbalances. It was evident across the data that supervision is a special form of teaching and needs to be conceptualised at least in part as a pedagogy. Moreover, the issue of institutional differentiation needs to be considered for the sector to achieve its intended goals of increasing doctoral output and to be able to participate fully in the knowledge economy. , Phuputso ena e fana ka tlaleho ea 'nete ea kahisano ea kamoo litsi tsa Afrika Boroa li ntlafatsang batsamaisi ba ntseng ba hlaha. Phuputso ena e sebetsana le tlhokeho ya ntshetsopele ya bolebedi ho tswa ho diyunibesithing tsa thuto e phahameng tsa setjhaba tsa Aforika Borwa. Sepheo sa phuputso e ne e le ho araba potso e mabapi le "Ke mekhoa efe e behang nts'etsopele le tšehetso ea baokameli ba ntseng ba tsoela pele ho pholletsa le liunivesithi tsa sechaba tsa Afrika Boroa?" E le ho hlahloba potso ena, ho ile ha sebelisoa li-analytical dualism ho arola likarolo tsa "batho" (baemeli) ho "likarolo" (sebopeho le setso) ho hlahloba likamano tsa bona. Thuto e ne e le ea boleng, 'me lintlha li ile tsa hlahisoa ka litokomane, phuputso ea inthaneteng, le lipuisano tse hlophisitsoeng hantle. Barupeluoa ba lekholo le mashome a robeli a metso e tšeletseng ba ile ba arabela phuputsong eo, 'me batho ba 54 ba botsoa. Barupeluoa ba ne ba tsoa liunivesithing tse mashome a mabeli ho tse mashome a mabeli a metso e tšeletseng tsa thuto e phahameng ea sechaba 'me ba emetse mefuta e mengata ea lithuto. Liphuputso tsa phuputso li senotse hore baokameli ba ntseng ba hlaha hangata ba ne ba ‘lahleloa botebong ba pelo kaha ba ne ba lokela ho etsa qeto ea ho laola ka ho ithuta ho liithuti tsa bona le ho sebelisa phihlelo eo ba e fumaneng ha ba ntse ba behiloe leihlo. Phihlelo ena e bile bothata haholo ho barupeluoa ba arolelanang boiphihlelo bona. Taba ea bobeli, liphuputso li fana ka maikutlo a hore ha liketsahalo tsa nts'etsopele li ntse li le teng, tse ling ha lia ka tsa amoheloa hantle, mohlala, hobane ba fanang ka koetliso ba ne ba sa nkoe e le ba ka tšeptjoang hobane ba ne ba se na boiphihlelo ba bolebeli kapa hobane ho ne ho bonahala hore ho na le mehato ea nakoana. . Ho bile le meipiletso ea hore ho be le litšebetso tse khethehileng tsa khalemelo le libaka tse kopanetsoeng moo baokameli ba neng ba ka buisana le baokameli ba nang le phihlelo ho e-na le ho rutoa ka mokhoa o tloaelehileng oa 'ho laola'. Liphuputso li bonts'itse hore litsela tse pakeng tsa ts'ebelisano-'moho le boeletsi hangata li ne li sa hlaka. Ho feta moo, ka bobeli li ne li sebelisoa e le mofuta o mong oa ntlafatso ea tlhokomelo. Likamano tse joalo li ne li fana ka mokhoa oa bohlokoa bakeng sa baokameli ba ba qalang ho utloisisa thuto e rarahaneng ea bolebeli ba morao-rao empa ka linako tse ling ba ne ba sitisoa ke ho se leka-lekane ha matla. Ho ile ha totobala ho pholletsa le data hore tsamaiso ke mokhoa o ikhethileng oa ho ruta 'me o hloka ho nahanoa bonyane e le mokhoa oa ho ruta. Ho feta moo, taba ea karohano ea litsi e lokela ho shejoa hore lekala le fihlele lipheo tsa lona tse reriloeng tsa ho eketsa tlhahiso ea bongaka le ho kenya letsoho ka botlalo moruong oa tsebo. , Thesis (PhD) -- Faculty of Education, Education, 2022
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- Date Issued: 2022-04
A case study of lessons learned through empowering and mobilizing unemployed youth into sustainable green jobs within the SANBI – Groen Sebenza partnership programme by a Host Institution in South Africa
- Authors: Fullard, Donovan
- Date: 2021-10-29
- Subjects: South African National Biodiversity Institute , Green movement South Africa , Environmental education South Africa , Communities of practice South Africa , Social learning South Africa , Biodiversity conservation Employees , Job creation South Africa , Mentoring South Africa , Groen Sebenza
- Language: English
- Type: Master's theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/191964 , vital:45183
- Description: This research project constituted as a thesis of limited scope for a Masters in Education Degree (i.e. as 50% of the degree) focusses on a job creation programme named ‘Groen Sebenza’ [Green Work]. Groen Sebenza is an environmental education ‘incubator’ programme driven and implemented by the South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI) to unlock green jobs and bridge the gap between education and job opportunities in the biodiversity sector in South Africa. The programme is a key intervention to strengthen biodiversity human capacity development in the biodiversity sector in South Africa, seeking to contribute to transformation of the biodiversity sector, and also address issues of youth unemployment in the country. The young ‘interns’ in the programme were called ‘pioneers’ at the start of the project. This research project explores how a host institution operating as a community of practice within a landscape of practice managed to implement the Groen Sebenza programme by absorbing and appointing all their pioneers into sustainable jobs beyond the pilot project. I sought to better understand the process of supporting and empowering unemployed youth into sustainable green jobs within the Groen Sebenza partnership programme. I drew on Community of Practice (CoP) theory, and its value creation framework to develop this understanding, and I under-laboured the analysis with a social realist analysis of enabling and constraining factors. The unit of analysis of a Community of Practice was a useful focus for the study, as these mentors, managers, and administrators were all involved in supporting the empowerment and retention of the young pioneers in the host institution. To develop deeper insight into the learning and knowing, and value created in and by the Groen Sebenza CoP in the Host Institution, I also sought insight into enabling and constraining factors and how these shaped and contributed to empowerment and retention of the pioneers in sustainable green jobs. The research addressed the main question of ‘How do processes of learning, knowing and value creation contribute to empowerment and retention of unemployed youth in a successful Host Institution in the Groen Sebenza programme, and what enabled or constrained the empowerment and retention processes and outcomes?’. Three sub-questions were used in the study, which focussed on the mentoring, training and workplace experiences and how they contribute to the process of learning and knowing within the Groen Sebenza Community of Practice in the Host Institution? [Addressed in Chapter 4], the value creation elements that emerged in the implementation of the programme in support and empowerment of the pioneers in the Host institution’s Groen Sebenza CoP? [Addressed in Chapter 5], and the enabling and constraining factors that shaped and contributed to the uptake of the Pioneers into sustainable green jobs at the Host Institution within the Groen Sebenza Programme? [Addressed in Chapter 6]. The research was conducted as a qualitative case study, in which I used semi-structured interviews as a key data source, as well as document analysis, and a questionnaire. The study drew on inductive, abductive and retroductive modes of inference since I sought to explore an understanding of the practices and learning that occurred that contributed and led to the successful uptake of Pioneers into jobs, as well as the enabling and constraining factors. The study was interpretive at the epistemic level, and had a social realist under-labouring at the ontological level. Key findings of the study point to the development of enabling cultures of mentoring in workplaces, and the provision of a diversity of workplace learning experiences including formal training. It also points to the importance of personal emergent properties amongst mentors and pioneers that embrace a willingness to work together and build strong relationships, and to learn together. Learning in the community of practice was shown to develop identity and a sense of belonging as pioneers were given meaningful tasks to do and their training and interactions with mentors was experienced as meaningful and relevant. The contributions of the pioneers to the institutional mandate was appreciated by the mentors and therefore also well supported within an empowerment orientation. Various structural factors contributed to this enabling situation, most notably strong support from management as well as good co-operation across divisions. Constraining factors included the physical distances in the province, as well as financial and technical issues such as poor ICT communication systems. Overall, though the study showed that a strong approach to learning in communities of practice supported by empowering mentoring can lead to the integration of young pioneers into sustainable green jobs in the environmental sector. A whole institution approach to this process is, however, needed, and the organisation needs to develop a culture of social learning. As recently as September 2020 as this study was being finalised, the Presidential Employment Stimulus Plan (Office of the President, 2020) following the initial economic shocks emanating from the COVID-19 pandemic, made yet another commitment to using the Groen Sebenza model to create and support sustainable job creation for young people in South Africa today in the environmental sector. This study has been developed and designed to understand those processes and enabling conditions that can support retention and empowerment of young people to take up jobs in the environmental sector today. Its recommendations may therefore be of value to those involved in seeking to support sustainable impacts in terms of retention and employment in programmes such as the Groen Sebenza, and in the Groen Sebenza programme itself as it continues to unfold as a key job creation tool for unemployed youth. , Thesis (MEd) -- Faculty of Education, Education, 2021
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- Date Issued: 2021-10-29
An analysis of selected Grade 8 mathematics teachers’ use of gestures as visualisation tools to support mathematical meaning-making
- Authors: Haipinge, David Tuhafeni
- Date: 2021-10-29
- Subjects: Gesture , Gesture in mathematics education , Visual learning , Visualization , Mathematics Study and teaching (Secondary) Namibia
- Language: English
- Type: Master's theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/191969 , vital:45184
- Description: The purpose of this Namibian case study was to investigate how different types of gestures are used to support the construction of mathematical meaning making in teaching and learning. Gestures of three selected Grade 8 mathematics teachers were observed and analysed. This study was intended to answer the following research question: how do selected Grade 8 mathematics teachers use gestures as visualisation tools to support mathematical meaning making? The study was framed by an enactivist perspective and the research was oriented in the interpretive paradigm. Data were collected through video-recorded observations of three selected teachers and through stimulus recall interviews. In order to generate rich data and support validity, five lessons per selected teacher were video recorded. The study found that the participating teachers incorporated a variety of mathematical gestures into their lessons in order to support and provide mathematical meaning. Further, this study found that gestures facilitated meaning making in mathematics. The findings in the study suggest a need for mathematics teachers to be trained in using gestures appropriately to communicate mathematically in their lessons. In addition, this study discovered a new type of gesture – the overlapping gesture in addition to McNeill's (1992) types, namely: pointing gestures, metaphor gestures, beating gestures and iconic gestures. This case study also showed that the more experienced the teachers are, the more mathematical gestures they produce during their mathematics lessons. , Thesis (MEd) -- Faculty of Education, Education, 2021
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- Date Issued: 2021-10-29