This research is a case study. The study investigates the teaching strategies currently utilized in the adult education classroom; ascertains the reasons for the use of such strategies and recommends teaching strategies that could be used in order to improve instruction. The research was conducted at an adult learning centre. In pursuit of his objectives, the researcher aimed to answer the following key questions: • What teaching strategies are currently being utilized in the classroom? • How effective are these teaching strategies in meeting the learning needs of the adult learners? • How do these teaching strategies relate to existing literature? Data was collected primarily by engaging in the observation of actual teaching in the classroom. Structured interviews were conducted with the educator and learners concerned in order to confirm the classroom observation findings. Although the findings from this study are problematic to generalize, the findings will give us a better understanding of teaching strategies. This understanding could be useful to: • Educators of adult learners with a view to improving their practice. • Researchers in the field of education. • Textbook writers and curriculum development specialists. • National and regional policymakers. • Anyone who has an interest in education. This study is guided by the theory of andragogy as expounded by Knowles. This theory is relevant because it informed the study as to how best teaching and learning of adults can be undertaken. Findings from this study reveal that the teaching strategy most frequently used are the mass instruction strategies. The lecture method is most frequently used. This method is made interactive with the incorporation of discussions, recitations and the use of questioning. Individual instruction and group instruction strategies are used to a limited extent. / Thesis (M.Ed.) - University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2007.

The problem of the study was to determine the status of patient education courses offered by undergraduate and graduate health education programs in the United States, and what was being taught in these courses.Two original data collection instruments were created. The first was a demographic tool used to collect data from colleges and universities (n = 120) during May/June 2004, and the second was a 59-item checklist used to conduct the content analysis of patient education course syllabi. It was found that only 9.2% of institutions that responded offered patient education courses, none of the syllabi included all 59 checklist items, there does not appear to be a statistically significant relationship between program accreditation/approval and the offering of a patient education course, and there does not appear to be a statistically significant relationship between programs that prepare students for the CHES examination and the offering of a patient education course. / Department of Physiology and Health Science

This research focuses on environmental education in initial teacher education, and is grounded in three interlinked and widely recognised assumptions. First, that education for sustainable living can assist in resolving some environmental problems that are contributing to the environmental crises of sustainability currently facing South Africa and the rest of the world. Second, that education for sustainable living can assist in the establishment of a new environmental ethic that will foster a sustainable way of living. Third, that teacher education is a vital process for the attainment of both. These assumptions inform the aim of this research, which is to explore the potential for the implementation of education for sustainable living, and to identify a strategy for this, for initial teacher education, for senior primary school student teachers in the Western Cape. The strategy is derived following the grounded theory approach, developed through the case study method. In the process of identifying the strategy, this study establishes that there are challenges at macro, meso and micro levels that are obstructing the changes necessary for education for sustainable living. Change theory provides the basis for explaining these shortcomings, by helping to identify the barriers that might obstruct the realisation of the changes that are necessary for education for sustainable living. These challenges need to be perceived in the light of overcoming three sets of barriers in the way of the potential implementation of education for sustainable living in teacher education. First are those that can be ascribed to the formal education system that, while clinging to Western, Eurocentric values on the one hand, bave also failed to secure a policy for environmental education on the other. Second are the barriers ascribed to the teacher educators themselves, with the whole notion of their powerlessness at its core. Finally, there are the logistical barriers, which encompass, for example, time and financial constraints. With these barriers as a backdrop, to facilitate the incorporation of environmental education into initial teacher education, the study identifies a need for the development of a strategy to secure that education for sustainable living assumes its rightful place in the curriculum for initial teacher education. This framework emerges from the theory grounded in the interviewees' responses during the research, and from the theory grounded in the literature. Central to this framework is for education for sustainable living to contribute to the realisation of real change, change that would further the transformation of our conflict-riddled and inequitable society towards a more democratic and just one. This thesis demonstrates that the realisation of the changes necessary for education for sustainable living demand a reconstruction of current teacher education in order to secure and to sustain an appropriate and sound education ethic to form the basis of a trans formative teacher education curriculum for sustainable living within initial teacher education. Except formal policy, but central to overcoming these barriers, is the need for professional development programmes for teacher educators. A strategy in this regard, is outlined.

The study aimed at researching the role of materials in flexible learning teacher education courses, specifically looking at the Eastern Cape Teacher Course as a case study. The research aimed at exploring how courses and materials were developed, selected, used and adapted or redeveloped so as to support the course orientation and the intended outcomes. I did this with the hope that my research might inform the process of improving the role of course materials in flexible learning teacher education courses. I did a naturalistic enquiry within which I interviewed 39 participants (teachers and teacher educators) and two course co-ordinators. I also analysed documents such as the course materials, nine participants' journals and seven of their assignments. The observation notes compiled during the early days of the course were not used as a main source of data but as support to data sources mentioned above. Questionnaires were handed out to all the course participants, i.e. course co-ordinators, tutors and student participants. The questionnaires were intended as a means for pre interview and post interview reflection for interviewees. Through this research, I have learnt a lot about the role of materials in professional development courses, including the importance of mediation of materials and their overt use during course sessions, the importance of providing and encouraging a culture of reading through time allocation during contact sessions, through discussions on materials, and also through providing orientating comm~nts on materials rather than just handing them out to participants. Readings that are more focussed do better to motivate participants to interact with them.

The object of this study was to determine the extent to which coordinators of Industrial Cooperative Training programs in Virginia high schools used the directed study method in directly related instruction, to compare its use with other teaching methods used, and to determine the coordinators‘ evaluation of its effectiveness as related to other methods. A list of 30 programs providing a representative sampling of the I.C.T. programs in the state system considered above average on the basis of past performance was secured from state supervisory personnel. Questionnaires prepared by the researcher were mailed to the coordinators of the selected programs, and to seven other state departments of education to determine the procedure found most effective in their directly related instruction. The questionnaires provided data for the study. The other state departments reported use of the directed study method for directly related instruction. In Virginia, where each coordinator was found responsible for his own program, all but five of the coordinators questioned considered the directed study method most effective in directly related instruction. The researcher concluded that the evaluative judgment of the individual coordinators resulted in agreement that the most effective instructional procedure in directly related instruction was the directed study method. The researcher also concluded that additional research in Industrial Cooperative Training is needed in comparing the effectiveness of the directed study method with that of other methods in actual use in the classroom, and in other fields necessary for complete understanding and utilization of directed study. / Master of Science

Submitted in fulfilment of the requirement for the Masters Degree in Technology : Operations and Quality Management - Durban University of Technology, 2014 / The study has been influenced by the experience of the researcher in inclusive education. In inclusive education, the educator is required to respond to the diverse individual needs of the learners. Since 1994, the education system has been continually changing, resulting in challenges. A number of policy documents have been published which provide scope for transformation and restructuring in education. The policy on inclusive education has resulted in major challenges in the classroom. This inclusive education policy document states that learners who experience barriers to learning should be accommodated in the mainstream school. The aim of this study was to evaluate the challenges of inclusive education in a mainstream school on the quality of teaching and learning. Primary data was collected for this study using a survey method. A questionnaire consisting of thirty items was used to gather the needed information from all foundation phase educators from fourteen selected schools in the eThekwini region of KwaZulu-Natal province. Data were analysed using descriptive and inferential statistical techniques. Conclusions and recommendations were thereafter drawn from the literature and the findings of the study. The study shows that the general knowledge of the respondents about inclusive education and barriers to learning are somewhat narrow. Most of the respondents have a negative attitude towards inclusive education, which can be attributed to lack of skills and the fact that inclusive education is still in its infancy stage in South Africa. It can be inferred that many of the schools are under-resourced and the implementation of inclusive education would be difficult under these conditions. The success of inclusive education is dependent on quality teacher education and training. A substantial effort is required to successfully implement the paradigm shift towards inclusive education and change the attitude of educators.

The causal effects of the skills of attending and obtaining task-relevant information on the pre-reading ability of one hundred and twenty-three preschool-age Head Start children were studied. Attending and obtaining task-relevant information (OTRI) were conceptualized as latent variables. Performance on a path-referenced test entitled Social Skills in the Classroom (SSITC) provided data which were observable indicators of these latent variables. Pre-reading ability was also conceptualized as a latent variable, with performance on another path-referenced test, the Reading Dimension, providing the observable indicators of this variable. Convariance structure analysis procedures were utilized to (1) link the observable indicators to their respective latent variable, through a confirmatory factor analysis model, and (2) to examine the causal effects of the latent variables on each other. A model representing the hypotheses that age, attending, and OTRI would be causally related to reading ability, that age would be causally related to attending and OTRI, and that no reciprocal relationships between these latent variables would be found was tested. This model provided a good overall fit with the data. T-values obtained under this model, however, suggested that the causal relationship between OTRI and reading ability was not significant. A second model in which this relationship was assumed to be zero was then tested and was found to provide a good overall fit with the data. A difference of chi-square test suggested that this was the preferred model. This model supported the original hypotheses that age and attending were causally related to pre-reading ability, and that age was causally related to attending and obtaining task-relevant information. The significance of the causal relationship between attending and pre-reading ability is discussed in terms of its implications for future research into the effectiveness of instruction in skills similar to those investigated in the present study.

Call number: LD2668 .P7 1973 M33

M.Cur. (Community Nursing Science) / Please refer to full text to view abstract

M.Ed. (Psychology of Education) / The political upheavals of decades before the advent of democracy left far reaching consequences to the South African education system. The culture of teaching and learning suffered a severe blow since schools were the battlegrounds of the oppressor and the oppressed. Whilst learners developed an academic attitude, teachers lost sight of their professional ethos. The oppressor’s ultimate aim was largely to create a black labour force mentality that is denied opportunities to creativity and critical thinking approach. A different approach to the training of student teachers was necessary if the integrity of the teaching profession was to be retained. This includes the inculcation of a perspective in which aspirant young student teachers embrace the teaching profession with more positive attitude to their practice. It is significant that diverse institutions such as the University of Johannesburg, with its education faculty, began to conceptualise a framework based on the educational excursion for first year B.Ed Students. The Golden Gate Educational excursion became an outdoor learning experience for realisation of the faculty framework. The framework expresses the commitment to the education and training of caring, accountable, critically reflective educational practitioners who would be able to nurture and support learning in a diverse educational context. The educational excursion curriculum was therefore, tailored to serve both conceptual framework and the professional development. This research report attempted to articulate the views of first year B.Ed students on the professional development after the Golden Gate educational excursion. A generic qualitative study situated within an interpretive research paradigm was applied in the study. Observations, interviews and feedback evaluation forms were vital in the collection of data. B.Ed first year students were the participants in the research process. The premise for the study of their professional development is deduced from Bronfenbrenner’s ecosystemic model. The central view is that development cannot be fully understood unless we view it in relation to various systems in which people are involved. It is therefore, viewed within the social context. Within the social context, students accumulate experience that determines how they attach and construct meaning to reality around their environments. The accumulated experiences as well as their personal reflection on the professional practice provide a learning experience that result in new paradigm about the teaching profession. Feedback evaluation forms completed by first year B.Ed. students served as a reflective exercise on detailed aspects of the excursion. Their views were well articulated and triangulated with interviews and observation data in form of pictures attached in the addendum. The evidence clearly showed a positive change of first year B.Ed. students’ views about teaching profession after Golden Gate excursion.