Maria Snyman, University of South Africa, South Africa

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ABSTRACT

In the recognition of prior learning (RPL) process that is completed for access to undergraduate studies, students and academics are the key participants. Their experience of the process appears to be under investigated, given the limited number of these studies that have been conducted at distance learning institutions. Therefore, it is important to explore the perceptions and experiences of academics and students of the RPL process, in order to make meaningful suggestions for improving the process. This research explored the RPL experiences of students and academics in the postgraduate context, at an open

distance learning (ODL) institution. Research participants who were directly involved in the RPL process, as applicants and as academic assessors, were involved. It was established that, apart from granting them admission to postgraduate studies, RPL candidates also benefited from the process on personal, as well as academic levels. The main aspect of RPL, preparation of evidence for assessment, similar to those of sustainable assessment, contributes to students becoming aware of their learning potential. Aspects of the

RPL process, that both candidates and academics found beneficial, were illuminated during this research project. The academics gained insight into the candidate learner profile, while candidates experienced the process as beneficial; both for gaining admission and the postgraduate context.1

Clever Ndebele, Walter Sisulu University, South Africa

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ABSTRACT

School climate is experienced differently by various staLecturers in higher education normally come into teaching with little, if any, formal professional training in teaching. The changing higher education landscape, for example, the increased student diversity, has begun to put pressure on academics to get solid grounding in pedagogical training. Many universities across the globe have now put systems in place to professionalise their teaching. This article reports on an initiative by a South African university to foreground the importance of professionalising teaching and learning among current and future university lecturers as a strategy to improve student success. The article discusses impressions of university lecturers enrolled on a formal higher education teaching qualification; the Post Graduate Diploma in Higher Education (PGDHE) on the usefulness of the qualification. Grounded in the interpretivist paradigm and premised on the qualitative research approach, this case study focuses on only one university. The research was conducted as part of a large National Research Foundation (NRF) research project on the enabling and constraining conditions in the uptake of professional development opportunities in teaching by lecturers, involving eight South African universities. A purposive sample of sixteen academics who had applied for and received funding support to enrol for a post graduate diploma in higher education was used for data collection. The lecturers responded to an open-ended questionnaire on their experiences of the first year of the two-year post graduate diploma and how their teaching practices had been affected by the attendance of that year’s sessions. Content analysis was used to identify emerging themes from the data. Findings from the study revealed that new ways of understanding teaching and learning and relating to students had emerged as a result of attending the first-year sessions and that the participants were developing an identity as university teachers. Based on the findings of the study, it is concluded that professional training in pedagogy is essential for university teaching; disciplinary expertise alone does not necessarily make one a good teacher. Based on the conclusions of the study, it is recommended that academics should undergo training to get solid grounding in pedagogical content knowledge before assuming duties as lecturers at university.keholders at a school; it is also affected by different perceptions, behaviours and social identities. This research set out to contribute to the knowledge of the perceptions of teachers and principals about the organisational climate of their schools. A quantitative study was conducted in one of the provinces in South Africa. The Organisational Climate Description Questionnaire – Rutgers Secondary (OCDQ-RS) was distributed among teachers and principals at 72 public secondary schools in KwaZulu-Natal. A range of statistical analyses was used to analyse the data. Open-ended questions allowed teachers and principals to express their perceptions regarding the factors that played a positive or a negative role in their relationships. The open-ended questions indicated that the perceptions of teachers and principals with regard to the climate in their school differed. Nevertheless, there was some agreement between the teachers and principals regarding particular factors that have an impact on the school climate, such as poor human relations, disrespect, poor work ethics and competitiveness among teachers. The results showed that, although the perceptions of teachers and principals differed, there was no clear evidence that these differences in perceptions had any direct impact on the school climate.

Isolde Lubbe, University of Johannesburg, South Africa Göran Svensson, Kristiana University, Norway

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ABSTRACT

A project-based work integrated learning (WIL) model that is a match between business postgraduate programmes, business postgraduate students and industry partners can increase employability and job opportunities. This study is based on a qualitative and inductive approach and a longitudinal study initiated in 2014 and evaluated in early 2020. Based on empirical findings in a South African setting, the model reflects that in gaining a sense of the environment via a WIL partnership, postgraduate students are better able to connect innovatively to grow the business. A win-win situation can be achieved where a university, business postgraduate students and industry interact to achieve consensus and a match between industry needs and educational skills. The challenges of companies to find and employ appropriately skilled employees among business postgraduate students can be met through the use of the model. The model contributes to WIL knowledge in a business disciplines. This study presents the argument that if universities and industry partners are able to match their needs, connect, collaborate and engage successfully, postgraduate job opportunities and employability could increase.

Hardson Kwandayi, Zimbabwe Council for Higher Education, Zimbabwe Tenson Muyambo, Great Zimbabwe University, Zimbabwe

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ABSTRACT

The paper observes that nearly all universities in Zimbabwe offer crash academic programmes that are commonly referred to as block release because students attend their face-to-face classes for a short space of time. The Covid-19 pandemic has intensified the use of block release. During block release sessions, students are taught all the course content for the whole semester which usually includes four courses. After the intensive face-to-face lessons, students are expected to write their assignments and then come back to write their final examinations at the end of the semester. The paper contends that the block release mode of instruction is typical distance education and therefore requires continuous student-instructor interaction through use of well-planned practice questions based on the course syllabus. To be effective, the paper suggests that the practice questions should be based on Benjamin Bloom’s taxonomy of questions. The questions focus on key verbs which include remember (or recall), understand, apply, analyse, evaluate and create. This approach enables students to master various types of knowledge which are factual, conceptual, procedural and metacognitive. The paper uses illustrative questions from public policy analysis which is a relatively new discipline in the context of Zimbabwe. The illustrative questions can also be applied across disciplines such as Family and Religious Studies, History and Geography.

Ingrid Potgieter, University of South Africa, South Africa Nadia Ferreira, University of South Africa, South Africa

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ABSTRACT

This article explored the relationship between self-esteem and job-embeddedness (as a set of psychosocial career meta-capacities) and the satisfaction with retention factors of female employees in a teaching and learning environment. The article further reports on the differences that exist between the psychosocial career meta-capacities and satisfaction with retention factors in terms of the demographic variables of age, race and qualification level as well as whether psychosocial career meta-capacities significantly predict satisfaction with retention factors. The study made use of a simple random sampling method to select a sample consisting of permanently employed females within a teaching and learning environment. Data were collected using the Culture-Free Self-esteem Inventory (CFSEI-2AD), Job-Embeddedness Scale (JES) and Retention-Factor Measurement Scale (RFMS). A quantitative research approach was followed. Correlational analysis revealed several links between the variables of self-esteem, job embeddedness and retention factors. Stepwise Regression Analysis results found that only job embeddedness (as a psychosocial career meta-capacity) significantly and positively predicted satisfaction with retention factors. The results of the Kruskal-Wallis tests provided partial supportive evidence that differences exist in self-esteem, job embeddedness and retention factors in terms of the demographic variables (age, race and qualification level). Recommendations are provided in terms of retention strategies to be implemented by human resource professionals, specifically for female employees within a teaching and learning environment.

Nicholus Tumelo Mollo, Edu-HRight Research Unit, North-West University,

South Africa

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ABSTRACT

Schools as learning organisations (hereinafter referred to as SLOs) for educators should be regulated and guided by education law and policies to ensure that educators acquire the required knowledge, skills and values. This study provides answers to the following research questions: (i) How do the South African education law and education policies regulate and guide SLOs? (ii) How are the South African education law and education policies that regulate and guide SLOs translated into practice? Research on SLOs has often focused more on non-legal and non-policy aspects. This study intends to close this research gap. A review of existing literature and the analysis of educational law and policy sources was conducted which is underpinned by the three SLOs’ dimensions of the Marsick and Watkins model. The two main findings are: (i) There are sufficient education law and education policies that regulate and guide SLOs in South Africa. (ii) The existing education law and education policies that regulate and guide SLOs for educators have not yet been successfully translated into practice. This study provides educators, school management team members and officials of the Department of Basic Education with recommendations that they can use to enable schools to become SLOs.

Thaabit Ismail, Cape Peninsula University of Technology, South Africa Thobeka Mda, Cape Peninsula University of Technology, South Africa 

Nomakhaya Mashiyi, Cape Peninsula University of Technology, South Africa

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ABSTRACT

This study identifies factors that motivated Grade 12 learners at a quintile 3 secondary school in post apartheid South Africa. A phenomenological qualitative approach was adopted. Semi-structured interviews were used to collect data from Grade 12 learners. Human Motivation theory and Self-determination theory were synthesised to form an underpinning theoretical structure. The results of the research study identified various factors that motivated Grade 12 learners: parental involvement, affirmation, and enjoyment of subjects. Knowing about such factors and applying motivational interventions at schools in poor areas affirms learners and empowers them to escape destitution, despair, cycles of illiteracy and poverty, and the bonds of a racist past. Teachers and parents should be cognisant of such important factors. School communities, particularly those in economically challenged areas, need to be made aware of the value of such motivating factors.

Shonisani Agnes Mulovhedzi, University of Venda, South Africa Ina (Jacobina Christiana) Joubert, SANTS Private Higher Education, South Africa

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ABSTRACT

This research paper focused on the strategies employed by teachers in the development of leadership skills in learners at the Foundation Phase. The study aimed at exploring the strategies which teachers employ in developing Foundation Phase learners to embrace sound leadership attributes as young learners must develop and assume leadership roles at an early stage. A purposive sampling procedure was followed to select eight Grade 3 teachers from four government primary schools. The study was qualitative in nature and data were collected through focus-group discussions, capacity building workshops and observations. Data were merged into relevant themes using thematic analysis. The study was grounded in participatory action research with Erikson theory of psychosocial development and transformational leadership theory as its theoretical framework. The main finding was that the strategies suggested and adopted by the participating teachers in the development of leadership skills in the Foundation Phase showed a significant effect on the learners' behaviour, performance, willingness and readiness to perform in various leadership roles.

Keshni Bipath, University of Pretoria, South Africa

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ABSTRACT

The purpose of this paper is to highlight three professional identity tensions that are experienced by beginning teachers: the change in role from student to teacher; conflicts between expectations and realities of mentor support given to students (mentees), and contradictory notions of learning to teach. Research shows that Early Childhood Development (ECD) is losing many highly qualified teachers due to the perceived lack of proper mentorship in developing professional identity. This article outlines a study to explore the mentoring needs of ECD teachers in developing a positive professional identity. Participatory Reflection and Action (PRA) as a data collection method, which relied heavily on interpretivism as epistemology was conducted. The research sample consisted of all fourth year (final-year) undergraduate BEd students (n=713), who had to attend the compulsory teaching-practice component of the teacher training programme for the first time during the second and third quarters of the academic year. The BEd (Foundation Phase) students’ completed matrices (maps) were transcribed, coded and categorised through thematic analysis. As a result, two dimensions of the participants’ identity construction emerged: (1) Positive Role Modelling and (2) Missed Opportunities. It is suggested that mentor training, as well as scheduled talk-time and reflection opportunities between the mentors and mentees could transform the Work Integrated Learning (WIL) landscape and enrich the professional identity of Early Childhood Education teachers.

Mojaesi Violet Phejane, University of the Free State, South Africa

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ABSTRACT 

Using a case study approach, this paper aims to explore the advantages and disadvantages of using Blackboard Collaborate as a tool for achieving increased access to Online education and training. The Health Sciences Faculty at a South African university uses methods of open education practices through Blackboard Collaborate for students in the Free State and across South Africa as well as internationally. The qualitative interpretive paradigm with descriptive research methods was used with seven lecturers and personnel interviewed on the effectiveness of this tool in supporting students’ online learning, backed by the Constructivist Learning theory. The use of Blackboard Collaborate effectively assists students who work and cannot attend classes to gain access to information through recorded videos and attending seminars online. Student grades improved in one of the modules: Interprofessional Education (NVER 4518/IPE), which relied on the use of Blackboard Collaborate. Findings show an improvement in student engagement in modules like MBchB_1-5 through the extensive use of Blackboard Collaborate, for not only delivering lessons but also in relaying essential messages. Using Blackboard Collaborate does not only help improve student grades but also opens possibilities of increased access to education and training opportunities. Blackboard Collaborate is used for multiple educational reasons such as broadcasting seminars, Departmental meetings, classes, first-year welcoming into the university as well as hosting tutorials online in aiding student access and success. Recommendations include advantages and disadvantages of using Blackboard Collaborate, feedback on the experiences and improvements in using this online teaching and learning teaching tool to achieve sustainable Open Education practices successfully.