Thesis (MEd (Education))--Cape Peninsula University of Technology, 2019 / The quality of education in South Africa has drawn critical attention as children continue to perform poorly as they progress through school. Reflective practice is promoted and implemented internationally as a method to improve quality teaching and learning. Nationally a growing interest in the implementation of reflective practice is reflected in the Department of Basic Education’s suggestion that teachers make use of reflective practice to inform their classroom planning. The objective of this study was to investigate the knowledge and understanding Grade R teachers have of reflective practice. As Grade R is the first year and the foundation of a child’s school career, it was of interest to explore whether teachers reflect on their practice. This study was located in an interpretivist paradigm using a case study design. Two Grade R teachers were interviewed using semi-structured interviews. Their annual, termly and weekly planning was analysed alongside the transcripts of the interviews, using thematic analysis to identify common themes of reflective practice in Grade R. Five themes emerged from the analysis, which enabled the exploration of the benefits and challenges of using reflective practice in Grade R. These five themes allowed for the development of the idea of using reflective practice as a means for improving teaching and learning in Grade R. The teachers interviewed value the idea of reflective practice as a way to meet the needs of the children. They describe it as an innate aspect of their teaching. However, they have a tacit understanding and knowledge of reflective practice and it was not evident in the documents they use to inform their teaching. For reflective practice to be encouraged teachers need support from within their schools and from the Department of Basic Education.

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The main purpose of the present study was to investigate the relationship between the Miller Analogies Test scores of graduate school students and their undergraduate grade-point averages, as well as to find the relationship between Miller Analogies Test scores and the grade-point averages in graduate school of these students. A secondary purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between each of the following variables: sex, age, curriculum and the performance levels of the subjects.

There have been few investigations employing the level of aspiration as a motivational independent variable. The problem of the present study was to investigate the effect of an expressed level of aspiration on a subsequent level of performance on a cancellation task and to relate this effect to socio-economic classifications.

The purpose of this study was to provide a description of teacher perceptions concerning behavioral and physiological vocal issues among current gender groupings in sixth-grade choir classrooms through the collection of survey research data. Participants selected for this study consisted of registered Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan area choral directors of the Texas Music Educators Association. Results of the study indicated that more girls were enrolled in sixth-grade choir than boys and that mixed choirs were more common than gender-specific choirs in sixth grade. Results also indicated that teachers perceived evidence of early voice change among both sixth grade boys and girls, and that there was a difference in behavior as students showed signs of puberty.

Marknaden för så kallade ”High Yield Bonds” – högavkastande obligationer – har under det senaste årtiondet genomgått en remarkabel utveckling, särskilt i Europa. Ett ökat antal ”non-investment grade”-företag söker strategiskt att emittera dessa obligationer för att finansiera sina verksamheter, vare sig detrör sig om upprätthållandet av betalningsströmmar till leverantörer, anställda eller andra intressenter; kapitalanskaffning; företagsförvärv; refinansiering av lån; eller andra företagsrelaterade aktiviteter. Trots denna utveckling är marknaden för högavkastande obligationer i Sverige jämförelsevis liten. Följaktligen söker denna studie svara på varför så få högavkastande obligationer idag emitteras på den svenska marknaden. Våra resultat visar att den svenska finansmarknaden karaktäriseras av starka och långsiktiga relationer mellan företag och banker vilket effektivt reducerar företagens behov av alternativa finansieringskällor. För det andra, om vi betraktar den förhållandevis lilla volym svenska företag söker emittera, är inte många företag i den position att kunna emittera obligationer i de summor som för närvarande efterfrågas av investerarbasen. För det tredje tycks det också existera en kulturell faktor bland marknadsaktörerna; en tendens att undvika att verka på företagsobligationsmarknaden. Till sist har också en djupgående kunskapsbrist som alla marknadsaktörer tycks uppvisa ytterligare försvagat spridningen av högavkastande obligationer. Givet de snabba förändringarna finansbranschen genomgår idag, främst en konsekvens av de senaste årens kris och de efterföljande regleringarna som kommit till stånd, kommer banker, företag och investerare vara tvungna att förändra sitt beteende. Dessa förändringar kommer förmodligen innebära att obligationer – och särskilt högavkastande obligationer – blir en mer attraktiv lösning och kommer förmodligen att innebära att företagsobligationsmarknaden på sikt till sist etablerar sig i Sverige så som är fallet i resten av Europa och USA.

In 2 experiments, I studied the effects of the establishment of Incidental Bidirectional Naming (Inc. BiN) for unfamiliar stimuli on reading comprehension for first-grade students. In Experiment 1, I measured the associations, differences, and predictive value between multiple measures of reading comprehension and Inc. BiN stimulus control in 22 first-grade students. Inc. BiN stimulus control was measured with familiar and unfamiliar stimuli and partitioned into groups according to degrees of Unidirectional Naming (UniN) and Inc. BiN. Measures of reading comprehension included the i-Ready® K-12 Adaptive Reading Diagnostic and Woodcock-Johnson® Tests of Achievement (WJIV®). Results indicated significant correlations between degrees of UniN for unfamiliar stimuli and reading comprehension. In Experiment 2, I studied the effects of the establishment of Inc. BiN for unfamiliar stimuli on multiple measures of reading comprehension in a single case, multiple probe design across dyads. I selected 3 dyads of first graders who textually responded at or above grade-level and demonstrated the absence of Inc. BiN stimulus control for unfamiliar stimuli. There were 3 reading comprehension measures: (1) explicit reading comprehension probe after reading a fiction and nonfiction passage, (2) read-do probe consisting of unfamiliar stimuli, and (3) WJIV® subtests. Participants acquired Inc. BiN stimulus control for unfamiliar stimuli through a Multiple Exemplar Instruction (MEI) intervention across listener and speaker responses. After participants demonstrated Inc. BiN stimulus control by emitting at least 80% accuracy across listener and speaker response topographies across two consecutive novel stimuli sets, I assessed reading comprehension performance. Results from experimenter-derived passage comprehension probes demonstrated increases across all 6 participants. Although read-do results were inconsistent, 5 participants demonstrated increases following the acquisition of Inc. BiN stimulus control. WJIV® results demonstrated the greatest increases in Passage Comprehension performance, while marginal and educationally significant increases were still observed across Reading Vocabulary and Reading Recall subtests.

Philosophiae Doctor - PhD / This study examined the effects of using Dialogical Argumentation and Assessment for Learning as an Instructional Method (DAAFLIM) in teaching static electricity focussing on lightning as an example of static electricity to Grade 10 learners. Three groups of learners from two township schools were used as a sample for the study. The Solomon three-group design was employed in collecting data. One class was used as the experimental group and the other two were the control groups: control 1 group and control 2 group. The study drew on theoretical frameworks associated with prior knowledge of learners such as the constructivist viewpoint. The frameworks that were applied in the analysis of the data were Toulmin’s Argumentation Pattern (TAP) and Ogunniyi’s Contiguity Argumentation Theory (CAT). The experimental group and control group 2 were exposed to DAAFLIM as a teaching method and AFL as the assessment strategy. The control 1 group was taught in the traditional chalk- talk method and assessment was mostly summative. The experimental and control 1 groups received pre-tests and also wrote a post-test whereas the control 2 group only wrote the post test.

<p> Ferritic- Martensitic (F/M) alloys have been used in reactors as cladding steels, wrapper steels. They have Good creep strength, longer lifetimes, less corrosion Powder Metallurgy Hot Isostatic Pressing (PM- HIP) alloys have been suggested as an alternative to be able to improve reactor safety. Gaining a better understanding on how PM-HIP microstructures change under irradiation could make them more viable for widespread use in reactors   </p>

Philosophiae Doctor - PhD / Many South African Foundation Phase learners perform poorly in literacy, especially in reading and writing. The Annual National Assessment (ANA) results show that many Grade 3 learners experience difficulties in reading and in writing sentences from pictures (Howie, Venter, Van Staden, Zimmerman, Long, Scherman & Archer, 2008). The learners also struggle to produce meaningful written sentences, even though they are taught through the medium of their own home languages, including African languages (Department of Basic Education, 2013). To enrich learners’ language and literacy skills, the Curriculum Assessment Policy Statement (CAPS) encourages the use of figurative and metaphorical language through the teaching of folklore. However, CAPS does not provide explicit guidelines on how folklore ought be taught to enhance learners’ literacy skills.