3. Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETDs) - All submissions

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    Evolution of my subject matter knowledge for teaching energy resources and its uses in Grade 11 : self study.
    (2013-07-24) Khumalo, Maureen K.
    The implementation of a new curriculum is a challenging issue to educators in many countries. In this country training for an implementation of a curriculum is done in one week and it takes a form of one a size fits all. The study investigated how I transform my content knowledge when teaching a new topic in the new curriculum. The aim of this study was to carry a self- study of how I transformed my content knowledge when teaching energy resources and its uses to make it comprehensible to learners. The following research question guided the study:  How did my PCK develop as I developed the broad content of the energy resources and its uses into focused, teachable and comprehensible content?  How did my planning and reflecting on practice change as I participated in the process of planning, developing and implementing the lesson plans? When teachers teach, they draw upon knowledge of their subject matter, general pedagogy as well as context. This could be improved by the contribution of the concept of pedagogical content knowledge where content and pedagogy are blended. Therefore, for this study I have chosen PCK as a theoretical framework because I will be looking at how my content knowledge can be transformed into content knowledge for teaching. The study employed a qualitative research, which uses multiple realities that are socially constructed through collective and individual definitions of the situations. It is a self –study focusing on my own teaching and intending to improve my practice as a teacher. The focus is myself teaching two grade 11 classes in a township school. Khumalo M. iv Data was collected in a form of concept maps, reflective journals, lesson plan and CoRE s and PaPeRs. CoRes and PaPe-Rs were used to capture and portray my PCK. The methodological tools used to document and portray my Pedagogical Content Knowledge when teaching energy and resources, used representations called Content Representation (CoRe) and Pedagogical and Professional – experience Repertoires (PaP-eRs). The CoRe elaborated on my construction of content, which framed the topic and each Pa-PeR, was a narrative derived from the classroom observations and the journal. Findings in this study indicate that using the CoRe and PaPeR as a tool to portray PCK helps in the development of content knowledge. Some elements of PCK could be identified and the implementation of developed lessons led to insight into my teaching. Learners participated more freely and develop confidence when home language was used. I gained confidence using the CoRe to develop lessons.
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    Reframing the roles of tutors in terms of pedagogical content knowledge : a study of a tutor-led planning process and the impact on tutors' knowledge and roles.
    (2012-09-20) Duncan, Catherine
    Postgraduate tutors have an important role to play in teaching and learning in higher education. There has been substantial research conducted in this area - much of it is orientated towards improving the quality of the methods of instruction and classroom practice. Far less research has been focused on the postgraduate tutors as producers of content. This research is based on an intervention that tasked five postgraduate tutors with planning two tutorials and designing an assessment task: activities that fell outside the scope of their usual work and roles. The aim of the research is to discover more about how postgraduate tutors, who typically have extensive and expert content knowledge, but very little pedagogical knowledge, develop pedagogical content knowledge. The study tracks the decision making process and the knowledge reservoirs that the participants emphasise in their planning and design in order learn about the teaching beliefs and priorities of these novice teachers. The analysis goes on to explore the criteria for legitimation that the postgraduate tutors establish and/ or entrench. The study finds that the participants are highly sensitive to the many kinds of constraints that circulate and that they in turn re-circulated. It goes on to suggest that postgraduate tutors are likely to reproduce the regulative rules that they find in operation and the cumulative messages of what is valued in terms of student and teacher performance in a given context.
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    Facing the challenge of learning and teaching gold mining grade 11 in the new curriculum : a self-study.
    (2012-08-31) Ndhlovu, Majabulile
    The South African government that was elected in 1994 made tremendous changes in the Education system. The new government came up with the new curriculum for Basic Education (grade R- 12). The new curriculum had new topics in physical science. This made me as a teacher doubt whether I would be able to teach new topics. During my time as a student, I was not taught mining at school or college. As a result, I decided to do a self study in order to investigate how I would learn gold mining as a topic in order for me to be able to teach it to my learners. My study involved studying my own teaching practice while learning and also finding out the key things that made me understand the content knowledge involved in the topic of gold mining. The self study was done in order to ensure that I understood the content knowledge and how best to teach it to the learners. I used a collaboration team, reflective journal, group interviews classroom observation and learners’ responses to collect data. The participants were my grade 11 learners and myself. My data was analysed using a PCK model, CoRes and PaPeRs. I had to learn the content knowledge and transform it to make it understandable to learners. I designed lessons using the prior knowledge of learners and integrating Physical Science and Geography. Lessons did not go as smoothly as I had expected. Learners wanted some of their existing knowledge to be included. The classroom activities depended entirely on the relationship between the teacher and learners. I carried out my study bearing in mind that implementation of the new curriculum depends not only on classroom interactions (DoE, 2002) but most importantly on the content knowledge that the teacher has and how it is transformed. Learners taught me to understand gold mining from the geographical point of view as well from the scientific point of view. From the beginning of the study they were really excited and were looking forward to new things. Using the learners’ science prior knowledge helped me design lessons that allowed me to learn to be a facilitator.
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