M.Ed. / The need to redress the educational deficiencies of the workforce and adult population generally is enormous, especially in the poverty stricken rural areas of the country. While the government has committed itself to redressing adult illiteracy, there are other issues like the language policy which make the situation even more complex. Although the country has eleven official languages, all of which have been recognized and given equal status, it is generally accepted that English will remain an important language of wider communication and of international communication for South Africa. The aim of this study is to explore the teaching of literacy in English as a second language (ESL) in literacy programmes in a rural area of Mapulaneng, in the Mpumalanga Province. For this aim to be achieved, an interpretive design is applied, and qualitative data-collection methods are used, which include the analysis of written documents, observations and interviews. The major finding of this investigation is: The teaching of literacy in ESL is not successful in Mapulaneng, a rural area of the Mpumalanga Province. The main reasons for this are: • The teaching of English literacy is approached inappropriately. Adult learners are not literate in the first language commonly used at the centres - Northern Sotho. The main implications of the findings are: There is a need for the training of literacy teachers in this rural area of Mapulaneng. There is a need for some form of communication between the Department of Education and Culture and all the stakeholders involved in adult education. Although not replacing the other languages, English should remain as the main language of learning.

This study sought to investigate the involvement of parents in the development of their children’s literacy. The study was conducted in a rural school in the Omaheke region of Namibia, a school selected for reasons of representativeness and convenience. The research took the form of an interpretive case study focussing on a study sample of nine parents, their children, and one teacher in the Ngeama community. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews and then subjected to comprehensive descriptive analysis. The findings of the study indicate that parents in the Ngeama rural community have not been effectively involved in their children’s acquisition of literacy, for a number of reasons. These include the parents’ not feeling appropriately empowered to influence the development of their children’s literacy, the absence of environmental literacy programmes within the community, and the shortage of literacy materials such as newspapers and magazines. Perhaps the most important factor is that there is no public or school library in the Ngeama community. In view of these findings, the study recognizes a need for parental empowerment in terms of knowledge, skills, understanding and resources allocation regarding the education of their children. It recommends that a relationship of trust and understanding be built between the school and the community to ensure the sound development of literacy skills. The study further recommends the establishment of a library in order to enhance the literacy levels of teachers, parents and children alike.

Before Namibia's independence in 1990 educational programmes and curricula gave little attention to environmental education which was detrimental to the development of environmental literacy in Namibia. The post independence education reform process paid special attention to the inclusion of environmental education in all spheres of learning. Furthermore, Namibia became a signatory to various environmental conventions thereby raising awareness about the environment and the potential challenges to a sustainable future. The initiatives of various environmental education projects since independence have responded to the growing concern of environmental education programmes, resulting in the establishment of the Namibian Environmental Education Course (NEEC). To date few studies have been conducted examining the relevance of EE programmes in relation to the professional practice of EE providers in the non-formal sector. This study focuses on the work done by two environmental education providers and four assistant environmental education tutors in Rundu, in North-Eastern Namibia. The study adopted a qualitative approach to investigate how the NEEC has shaped and informed the practice of EE providers in the non-formal sector and also how the NEEC has responded to the Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) programme. The study employed three data collection instruments: interviews, field observations and document analysis. The findings indicated that despite the input of the NEEC programme which provided an understanding and knowledge of environmental problems to the EE providers, there are issues that continue to hamper the effective practice of these providers. The study revealed that the NEEC programme, while within the structure of ESD, does not give explicit guidelines for identifying Namibia's environmental challenges and clear strategies of how to respond to these challenges. The findings of the study have provided valuable insights into aspects of an EE programme that need to be addressed to support EE providers in responding to key environmental challenges in their regions and contribute to the decade of Education for Sustainable Development.

M.A. (Applied Linguistics) / Despite a worldwide drive to eradicate illiteracy, the numbers of illiterates are still soaring. Southern Africa is no exception to this. Even though statistics regarding illiteracy may be misleading, there are an estimated 400 000 illiterate mother tongue speakers of Afrikaans in South Africa. This study tries to establish the reasons for this situation within a historical-political framework. It further provides a sociocognitive basis for mother tongue literacy teaching, relying on the discipline of sociolinguistics. Literacy skills form part of the language user's communicative competence; this study, therefore, endeavours to situate literacy teaching within the communicative approach to language teaching with its emphasis on the needs of the language learner, the functionality of the acquired skills and the active participation of the language learner in the teaching activities. From this perspective a selection of literacy material in Afrikaans, representative of both the mainstream "establishment" type and the more "radical" school, is discussed to arrive at a theoretical and practical rationale for the teaching of literacy to Afrikaans mother tongue speakers, stripped of political undertones which so often direct literacy programmes. The main critique on Afrikaans literacy material is that it is either too behaviouristically structured or that no planned progressive structuring has been built into the courses. Both types of material can lead to dissatisfaction amongst literacy students if the respective course does not fulfil their need for literacy. This situation is often the result of an incomplete needs analysis and the creation of literacy material without a clear image of the target group. The unstructured manner in which literacy material is created and distributed is due to the lack of a national literacy strategy, as well as the nature of adult literacy teaching where specific needs of specific groups of illiterates dictate the type of material. A way of counteracting these problems would be to establish a national organisation to coordinate, amongst others, the development and distribution of literacy material. In this material the needs of the learner will be in a central position with the interaction between the learner and the teacher taking place in meaningful contexts. A thorough knowledge of andragogy and applied linguistics can therefore help to develop literacy material that will benefit Afrikaans illiterates, be they mother tongue speakers of the language or second language users who need to be literate in Afrikaans.

This dissertation chronicles my search to engage high school English students in inquiry as part of a formal research process. The perspective of critical literacy theory is used to describe the four phases of the problem posing process in shaping student research and action. Grounded in Freire's approach and consistent with Dewey and others who advocate inquiry, action and relevance, Wink's process is built into the instructional plan described in this study. Because of the real-life context of the classroom and the complex social phenomena being considered, a case study methodology was utilized in which multiple sources of data converged to develop the themes. Data sources included the work and artifacts of ten students in a tenth grade English class during the spring semester of 2008. The analysis focuses on the supports, the constraints and the impact of problem posing on the high school research assignment. The analysis, findings, and conclusions contribute to the literature in three areas: audience, reflection and grading.

This project presents a reading strategy in which students who are learning to read are introduced to the reading process in a comprehensible manner regardless if it is in the student's primary language.

This project is a web site dedicated to providing computer literacy resources that assist teachers in designing quality, interesting, and educational curricular units directed toward adolescent learners.

There is a growing expectation that school librarians function within their job descriptions beyond the role of reading promoter and resource manager. With college and career readiness standards, technology use and digital learning standards and information literacy standards now in place for student learning expectations, it is vital that students have opportunities to acquire, develop and practice such skills for future success in the global market economy. For students to receive such opportunities, there should be designed instruction delivered to students that allows for them to learn and practice information gathering techniques to access, use and apply information effectively, efficiently and ethically while developing technology skills within context of their content learning and real-world connections authentically. This study examined how school librarians conveyed information gathering techniques to students through a qualitative, constant comparative approach. Five middle school librarians in an urban school district participated in an observation and interview. Findings suggest that school librarians do claim an instructional role regarding information gathering and technology usage, although it manifests in diverse ways. Implications for future studies and practice suggest that the position become more defined such that the expectation to function in these roles is widely accepted by all stakeholders, and for the effectiveness of the instruction on the development of these skills. As school librarians embrace and adopt new and emerging technologies within their instructional delivery, examining the effectiveness of that instruction would be of interest.

No description available.

The changing role of literacy in primary education, with its emphasis on the acknowledgement of the learner’s values, beliefs, culture, background and language is the focus of this study. The research was concerned with understanding the literacy practices of Foundation Phase Grade 3 teachers who are able to intentionally promote and mediate literacy acquisition among their learners. A qualitative design was used to describe the approaches of effective literacy teachers. The research study discovered that while the teachers made use of a number of teaching methods that underpinned a de-contextualised and constructivist approach, a socio-cultural approach to literacy was lacking. The results call for a broadening of the definition of literacy; one that acknowledges the socio-cultural background of the learners in developing a literacy disposition that prepares learners for a changing world. / Educational Studies / M. Ed. (Didactics)