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
Reforging Ockham’s Razor: an enquiry into the ontology of parsimony arguments
- Authors: Dichmont, Thomas
- Date: 2022-10-14
- Subjects: Logic , Metaphysics , Ontology , Knowledge, Theory of , Epistemology , Philosophy and science , Occam's razor
- Language: English
- Type: Academic theses , Master's theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/406736 , vital:70303
- Description: Nearly every philosopher in English-speaking world has heard of Ockham’s Razor, which is given in one of two ways, don’t multiply entities beyond necessity and all things being equal choose the simpler explanation. Yet it is unclear from the scholarship whether the use of Ockham’s Razor is justified in science and philosophy. However, if it can be shown to ‘get’ us truth, it would gain an unequivocal justification, as disputes that are continued after the parties to the substantive truth of one or the other are defined as frivolous. Alternative, one may contend that explanation could have other criteria of success. The implication of a direct connection between the razor and truth comes with ontological commitments, namely a commitment to realism (about universals) and philosophical theism. This is contrary to the razor’s use as a tool of nominalism and naturalism. I argue in this thesis there that the only possible non-circular justification for Ockham’s Razor is truth and that therefore certain philosophical positions are excluded from using the razor to animate their positions. There is an additional, second criteria for the success of our inquiry, namely the justification must in some way be consistent with the razor, which means the chosen explanation for the razor, must be simpler than any of its rivals and not have superfluous entities, otherwise our justification would be contrary to the advice of the razor. We are presented with a Scylla and Charybdis type problem, we avoid a circularity on the one hand and on the other we must not contradict the razor itself, these are contrary intellectual impulses. So firstly I will look at disciplines outside philosophy for some initial inspiration. If we could answer this question in a ‘non’ philosophical way, the problem would have solved itself in a way that require little change of practice. If lawyers or scientist can account for the razor properly, there is not really a problem of justification, at least not a philosophical one. Second, I consider the realist and theist positions, namely an argument of Aristotle’s in the Posterior Analytics and part of Aquinas’ On the Divine Simplicity. Further, I consider the work of Ockham as a nominalist. Lastly, I consider modern and contemporary philosophy, in the form of Hume, Quine and Sober (a modern writer on the razor). The aim here is to ‘stress test’ the philosophical resources of the various systems and analyse the results to see if they can produce a non-circular result. , Thesis (MA) -- Faculty of Humanities, Philosophy, 2022
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- Date Issued: 2022-10-14
Practicing conciliation: Towards a practical application of the Equal Weight View
- Authors: Hartley, Danyel Jordan
- Date: 2021-10-29
- Subjects: Knowledge, Theory of , Opinion (Philosophy) , Verbal self-defense , Epistemics , Interpersonal relations , Equal Weight View
- Language: English
- Type: Master's theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/188341 , vital:44745
- Description: The Equal Weight View is a frequently discussed position in the philosophy of disagreement. It holds that when someone disagrees with an epistemic peer, they should adjust their belief to be closer to their peer’s belief. While the reasons for adopting this response to disagreement have been debated, there has been less discussion about its utility as a tool for handling real-world disagreements. In this thesis I pursue a version of the Equal Weight View which is useful in practice. I argue that traditional applications of the Equal Weight View do not reflect its underlying principles when they are used to resolve real-world disagreements. I develop an idealized application of the Equal Weight View that addresses the problems traditional applications face in real-world scenarios. Unfortunately, addressing these problems results in an application that is unrealistically cognitively demanding. The application trades being insensitive to the environment it would be used in for being insensitive to the limits of its user. I suggest that we might be able to save the idealized application and work around those limits by either externalizing or simplifying the most demanding aspects of the application. Externalization is best achieved by making use of some kind of computer assistance. Simplification involves replacing taxing data tracking and computation with heuristic methods. While neither approach is ideal, I argue that both get us closer to resolving disagreements in accordance with the underlying principles of the Equal Weight View than traditional applications do. , Thesis (MA) -- Faculty of Humanities, Philosophy, 2021
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- Date Issued: 2021-10-29