After the introduction of Learner Centred Education in Namibia, a number of studies were conducted on how teachers either perceived learner centred education or implemented it. However, very few studies investigated the teachers' understanding of both subject matter knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge; primarily, how they understand and develop key concepts. The purpose of this study was to investigate how Grade 5 teachers' understand and develop key concepts in Social Studies in selected schools in Namibia. The study focused on three teachers in three primary schools in the Caprivi educational region of Namibia. These teachers were purposefully selected as graduates of the teacher education programme instituted at the time of the Namibian education reform process. As a teacher educator, my main motive of conducting this study was to gain a better understanding of some of the issues that have been raised about these graduates' lack of content knowledge. The study adopts a qualitative approach and seeks to investigate (a) how the three teachers in this study understand key concepts and (b) the strategies they use to develop such concepts. Three data collection instruments were employed: interviews, document analysis and class observations. The findings indicate that despite the training that all three teachers in this study received, their understanding of the concepts they taught is problematic. Furthermore, some of the strategies that the teachers used did not bring about learning with understanding. The results of the study revealed how these teachers' problems with concepts and the development of conceptual understanding are related to specific issues and can be attributed to a number of factors. Because of this, the study has provided valuable insights into aspects of teacher education that need to be addressed both in terms of in-service and pre-service programmes to support teachers in teaching for understanding, a key idea underpinning the reform process.

The effects of instruction integrating pictorial and textual components in a fifth and a seventh grade Social Studies lesson were investigated. Measures of recall were examined both immediately after the lesson and after a two week delay. Experimental instruction focusing on the integration of illustrations with the expository text was compared to the more conventional classroom procedure of focusing on the written text through guided silent reading. The fifth grade experimental group outperformed the conventional group on all measures of immediate and delayed recall. The seventh grade experimental group had higher scores than the conventional group on one delayed measure of recall, a short answer test. No particular reading ability level was benefited more than another by the experimental treatment in either grade. An examination of gender differences revealed that fifth grade females in the experimental group outscored males on one immediate measure of recall, a short answer test. Implications for instruction and further research are discussed. / Education, Faculty of / Language and Literacy Education (LLED), Department of / Graduate

The study examined student perceptions of global issues when introduced through their Logarithms unit in the Principles of Math 12 course and student opinions regarding the suitability of the issues within the course. Through journal books, the students expressed thoughts, ideas, and concerns related to the mathematics and the global issues. With our global environment being threatened in numerous ways, a need to educate through 'responsibility' is essential. In mathematics, students require relevancy when expected to learn increasingly difficult material. The study addresses the questions of: do students concerns for global issues increase when viewed through a mathematical lens and do the students believe that the global issues have a place in the math class? The findings were varied based on individual experiences of students within the study. In summary, the majority of the students gave positive feedback towards the use of the global issues within the math class. However, there were concerns from weak and strong students and from students currently studying similar topics in Geography. As well, several ESL students expressed concerns surrounding their difficulties with the written language, and anxiety regarding their emergent academic standing. The students favoured global exposures in the math class when they were able to actively participate with a solution, and when direct links to the mathematics being studied at the time was relevant to the global issue. Conclusively, more accessible resources are required for instructors, and more time is needed in the classroom to effectively implement, for all learners, global issues in the mathematics course. / Education, Faculty of / Curriculum and Pedagogy (EDCP), Department of / Graduate

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This project has developed a resource guide that will help kindergarten, first, and second grade teachers implement an integrated history-social science curriculum that encourages children to become critical thinkers.

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In 2016, the Colombian National Congress endorsed the Peace Agreement with the largest guerrilla group in the country, FARC. Prior to this political benchmark episode, the National Government, under different executive agendas, sought to overcome the Colombian armed conflict through different approaches. Formal education has been historically conceived as a central area for advancing peace and democracy. Today, under a holistic model of Transitional Justice and the slow implementation of the 2016 Peace Accords, schools hold a key role in forming young citizens for peacebuilding, respect for human rights, and democratization. In this research project, I examine how high school students take up civic subjectivity in relation to the ongoing political transition in Colombia. I also explore the interplay between civic subjectivity and historical memory, emphasizing how students’ understandings of the past inform their civic positionings and actions in the present regarding the armed conflict and the prospects for conflict transformation. This study engages with the Foucauldian conceptualization of subjectivity as the two-fold process of “being-made” and “self-making”. Drawing on 22 weeks of ethnographic fieldwork at Colegio San Antonio public school (Eastern Antioquia), I analyze students’ encounters with the difficult past —often in the form of textured silences— and how these give shape to their construction of previous and contemporary armed violence and civic action/responsibilities on this matter. By paying attention to participants’ everyday lives and social navigation inside and outside of school, this dissertation discusses the tensions and negotiations youth face in the process of giving historical and political meanings to the armed conflict and current transition. It also sheds light on the intertwined dimensions of temporality, spatiality, and experience in how youth conceive and position themselves as civic actors. This study demonstrates how, through civic disjunctures, students partake in their becoming as citizens who challenge fixed and already-established notions on what peace is, should be, and what the school is expected to do to form peaceful citizens. This dissertation concludes with some reflections about the possible intersections between civic education and Transitional Justice’s efforts.

This study is concerned with the availability and the use of certain learning aids in the teaching of social studies in Yuba County elementary schools. FIeld trips and speakers are the learning aids which have been included in this study.