The aim of the study was to investigate the quality of diagrams and explanations of moon phases in grade 6 to 8 Natural Science textbooks; to establish whether the textbooks provide scientifically correct content information for learners and teachers and to investigate whether the textbooks used for teaching are effective conceptual development tools for grade 8 learners, specifically when exploring moon phases. The research consisted of two phases, where the first phase investigated the quality of textbooks, and the second phase investigating learners’ ideas about moon phases.

A research report in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science in the School of Science Education of the Witwatersrand. Johannesburg, 1995. / This project is concerned with a multimedia package which incorporates comics, video and pupil workbooks. The intention as to determine the effectiveness of the package on the conceptual change of pre-service teachers, using an empirical research method and decriptive analysis of results. Logistical constraints experienced at colleges of education and schools led to an alternative evaluation of the packaqe with D.E.T. college lecturers at RADMASTE workshop. Results indicated that, if properly administered, the multimedia package can assist users in identifying and changing tneir interfering preconceptions and misconceptions while they are enjoying the story. / MT2017

A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Science, Unjversity of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, in fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Science. March 1995 / This thesis reports on school teaching and learning problems in the area of chemical re&ctivity and on an attempt to overcome some of these problems with an in-service course for teachers. rhase 1 of this research was a study of the conceptions of aspects of reactivity, rates of reaction and chemical equilibrium held by secondary school students. The nature and origin of the conceptual di:Eficltlties, i.n the above areas were investigated. The concepts of ret,ctivity and reactivity se.rd.e s are formally introduced at a standard 8 level. These concepts form a springboard for the understanding of more formal quantitative worl< done i.n rates of reaction and chemical equilibrium at a standard 10 level. Two multiple-choice questionnaires, a reactivity qUestionnaire and a i'a'Ceand (.,quilibrium qUestionnaire, were designed to probe for the nature and ori9i.n of views held )y st<mdard 8 & 10 students respectively. The views of both the standard 8 & 10 students on aspects of react~vity and reactivity series Were investigated using the reactivity ql.ltlstionnaire.The views of a sample of 'Jtandard 8 students were also probed during interview sessions conducted at selected schools. standard 10 students views about concepts related to aspects of rates of reaction and chemical equilibrium, were also investigated

Research report submitted to the Faculty of Science University of the Witwatersrand Johannesburg, in part completion for the Master of Science Degree, / Three case studies were conducted involving Andrew, Ferrial and Mary. A number of aspects relating to their experiences were explored and are described in this report. In addition to their personal accounts, their views about the nature of science, science teaching and learning were sought. The study also surveyed HDE students' knowledge of certain concepts related to chemical bonding and acids and bases. The case studies were observed during their teaching practice to establish how the aspects mentioned above relate to their practices in the classroom. Data was collected through intervews, journals, classroom observation both in their science methodology classes and during teaching practice and diagnostic tests. It was found that school backgrounds influenced Ferrial's and Mary's perceptions of the HDE programme. They both appreciated those aspects of the metholodologies that were directly linked to preparation for teaching, such as the mini lessons, test design, the practical work, and enriching their knowledge of science concepts through discussing science content. Both were very anxious about their competence in teaching science. They considered the assignment work excessive, irrelevant, and frustrating and were sometimes not sure what was expected. Ferrial felt .they were given too much work. Andrew, on the other hand did not seem to find any problems. He liked the practical approach followed in the classes and appreciated the suggestions made. His experiences were more of a personal nature and related to the fact that he was engaged in part time teaching. Their conceptions of science, teaching and learning were modified rather than changed during the year of study. They were not always successful in trying out their theories of teaching and learning and applying the suggestions made in the HDE courses because such moves were sometimes unacceptable to their students or cooperating teachers. In Andrew's situation implementation of suggestions were impeded by lack of appropriate facilities. It was also found from this study that student teachers had several erroneous ideas about chemical bonding and acids and bases irrespective of the depth of their chemical background. It was further found that discussing chemical bonding helped the students change some of their ideas to more acceptable ones. / Andrew Chakane 2018

Submitted in partial fulfilment of an M.Com. degree in Information Systems, Faculty of Commerce, Law and Management, University of the Witwatersrand, March 2017 / Purpose – The aim of this research is to examine one case of the adoption and contextualisation of an international computing curriculum at a South African university in order to improve the understanding of this process for literature as well as practice. An international computing curriculum is a curriculum developed by international professional and scientific bodies such as the Association for Information Systems (AIS), Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) or the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM). Design/methodology/approach – The research adopts an interpretivist approach and follows an exploratory research design using qualitative methods to gather data and directed content analysis for data analysis. The research site is a traditional South African university which has used the IS2010 curriculum as a guideline for their undergraduate Information Systems degrees. The site was chosen using convenience sampling. Data was obtained through interviews with staff at the Information Systems department as well as university documentation. Findings - The research indicates that university objectives, university context and industry skills needs have shaped the way the university has adopted and contextualised the IS2010 curriculum. The research also indicates that there are two types of challenges that were encountered: challenges caused by IS2010 and existing challenges that affected IS2010. The major challenges caused by IS2010 were the absence of important elements related to teaching and learning, particularly pedagogy. The challenges that affected the adoption of IS2010 but were not caused by IS2010 were challenges that the university was already facing. These include the language of instruction, institutional culture, staff shortages and students’ cultural and educational background. Originality and Practical contribution – Most of the research on this area focuses on African countries other than South Africa. Researchers have argued that it is important to conduct this kind of research on an individual country level because of the unique nature of the challenges facing each country. This research is an attempt to conduct such research specifically for South Africa. The research findings have shed light on how a South African university may adopt and contextualise an international computing curriculum and the challenges the university might face in doing so. This will in turn help computing educators in addressing such challenges and provide some guidance on how to go about doing so. The research also puts forward a conceptual framework that can be used to research computing curriculum contextualisation in South Africa. / GR2018

The purpose of this study was to investigate whether learners from different primary schools would respond to cell phone SMS (short message service) questions related to their schoolwork after school hours. As young people use cell phone technology to socialise, it seemed appropriate to consider integrating this technology within the school-framework, as many schools do not allow the use of cell phones during school. Another aim was to find out whether socio-economic backgrounds or gender groups responded differently to the SMS interaction study. A concurrent triangulation design research method was applied. The study examined how often and what types of answers learners would submit via SMS after school hours. The principal conclusion was that the learners reacted positively to the SMS feedback response sent in reply to an SMS answer and then engaged to a greater degree with the further questions.

This study explored the effects of Problem-Based Leaning (PBL) with webanchored instruction in nanotechnology on the science conceptual understanding, the attitude towards science, and the perception of science in society of elementary students. A mixed-methods approach was used. Subjects (N=46) participated in the study for approximately two and a half weeks. A pretest was administered for science conceptual understanding and for attitude towards science. An intervention, web-based nanotechnology anchor, Catching the Rays, followed. Catching the Rays navigated subjects through a nano quest on sunscreen. After the intervention, a posttest was administered for each science conceptual understanding and attitude towards science. Following, a purposeful selection of interviewees (N=6) participated in a Nano Post- Interview. Pretest/posttest data were analyzed using a paired t test. Results of the paired t test for science conceptual understanding (post- being larger than pre-, p <. 01) and attitude towards science (post- being larger than pre-, p < .01) were significant at the p < .05 alpha level. Nano Post-Interview data were coded and analyzed independently by two raters for emerging themes. Two themes of "Risks and Benefits" and "Solves Problems" emerged from subjects' (N=6) responses to perception of science in society questions. The theme of "Risks and Benefits" strongly suggests that subjects have a positive perception that nanotechnology comes with risks and benefits to society. The theme of "Solves Problems" strongly suggests subjects have a positive perception that nanotechnology is governed by society's needs and is used to help solve society's problems. Findings from this study suggest that PBL with web-anchored instruction in nanotechnology had a positive effect on subjects' science conceptual understanding, attitude towards science, and perception of science in society. / by Karla Anne Yurick. / Vita. / Thesis (Ed.D.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2011. / Includes bibliography. / Electronic reproduction. Boca Raton, Fla., 2011. Mode of access: World Wide Web.

The purpose of this study was to determine how Florida (FL) private, middle school (MS) leaders define highly qualified (HQ) MS science teachers, and how congruent their definitions are. The study also determines how congruent these leaders’ definitions are with FL, national, and National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) definitions. Lastly, the study determines the major challenges these private MS leaders have in hiring MS science teachers who meet the NSTA definition of HQ. / Includes bibliography. / Dissertation (Ph.D.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2015. / FAU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Collection

Orientador: Lizete Maria Orquiza de Carvalho / Banca: Rejane Aurora Mion / Banca: Jair Lopes Júnior / Resumo: Assumindo o desafio de estabelecer condições que levariam os educadores à percepção da necessidade de vincular o trabalho que desenvolvem na escola com o seu processo de formação contínua, nesta pesquisa, buscamos representações de professores de ciências sobre uma série de projetos desenvolvidos em uma escola, para os quais eles eram permanentemente convidados. Trata-se de uma pesquisa participativa, uma vez que éramos também o professor/mentor dos referidos projetos. Utilizamos um método de entrevista, denominado de "reflexivo", caracterizado pela possibilidade de o pesquisador compartilhar com o entrevistado sua compreensão dos dados. Através da Análise de Conteúdo e do ponto de vista do paradigma crítico para a formação de professores, nós pudemos perceber alguns aspectos da situação. Por um lado, os projetos apareceram para os professores como uma valorosa oportunidade para que os estudantes reconstruíssem seu envolvimento com o estudo e sua forma de caminhar em direção a objetivos pessoais de vida. Por outro lado, estes professores não percebiam a necessidade de interlocução com teorias educacionais, implícitas no trabalho da docência, de modo que, durante as entrevistas, o contraste de nossa posição com a deles consistiu no fato de que almejávamos "trazer colegas" para a reflexão sobre formação docente. Atribuímos essa diferença à qualidade do "convite" que recorrentemente fizemos a eles, durante o desenvolvimento dos projetos, que se restringiu à participação deles em um trabalho de "investigação-ação prática" e não de "investigação-ação teórica-prática". / Abstract: Assuming the endeavor of establishing conditions that could lead educators to the perceptions of a necessity of connecting their job in the school with their process of professional development, in this research, we seek out science teachers' representations about a set of projects developed in a school, for what they were permanently invited. In fact, that is a participative research, since we were also the teacher/mentor of the referred projects. We made use of an interview method, called "reflexive", characterized by the possibility for the interviewer to share data comprehension with the interviewed. Through the Content Analysis and from critical paradigm point of view for teacher education, we grasped some aspects of the situation. By one hand, the projects appeared to the teachers as a valuable opportunity for the students to reconstruct both their own involvement in the study process and their way of persuading personal objectives of life. On the other hand, these teachers did not realize the necessity of maintaining a interlocution with educational theories, implicit in teaching work, so that, during the interviews, there were a clear contrast between their position and ours, respecting to bringing colleagues to a critical thinking on teacher development. We attributed such a difference to the quality of the "invitation" we did to them during the projects, that was restricted to participation in a "practical investigation-action" instead a "theoretical-practical investigation-action". / Mestre

The purpose of this study was to determine whether teaching students about the structure of a text would be associated with improved reading comprehension. Science texts were used with the intention of adding to what is known about content-area reading comprehension. To investigate the effects of teaching science text structure, a reading comprehension program called Comprehending Science Texts with Structure (CSTS) was developed and tested using an true experimental design. Importantly, the study was conducted in China with Mandarin-speaking students, with whom there has been a great shortage of reading research. The CSTS program is a 15-lesson reading comprehension program designed to teach middle school students how to comprehend science texts by using three text structure strategies, namely asking generic questions (GQs), using graphic organizers (GOs), and summary writing (SW). A total of 88 sixth grade students participated in this study and were randomly assigned to either the CSTS intervention group or the content-only control group. After the completion of the CSTS program, students’ text structure knowledge and reading comprehension were measured using researcher-designed measures of the comprehension of both science and generic text. The generic text was used in order to investigate near-transfer effects. Far transfer was measured post-intervention through the use of two standardized reading tests, one taken from a state assessment and the other from the PISA reading test. Results from multivariate analyses of covariance indicated that, overall, students in the treatment group significantly outperformed their counterparts in the control group after controlling for pretest reading skill and science knowledge. Specifically, students who received the CSTS intervention showed significant acquisition of science texts structure knowledge and also significantly outperformed the controls in the comprehension of science texts. The results also demonstrated the near-transfer effects of the CSTS from science texts to generic texts; here, students in the treatment group significantly gained generic text structure knowledge and also significantly outperformed the controls in the comprehension of generic texts significant. A far-transfer effect, however, was not found, as the two groups did not show a statistically significant difference in performance on the post-test standardized reading comprehension tests.