Thesis (Ed.D.)--Duquesne University, 2006. / Title from document title page. Abstract included in electronic submission form. Includes bibliographical references (p. 164-181) and index.

Thesis (M.A.)--Miami University, Dept. of Psychology, 2007. / Title from first page of PDF document. Includes bibliographical references (p. 42-51).

Thesis (M.S.)--Springfield College, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references. Also available online (PDF file) by a subscription to the set or by purchasing the individual file.

Thesis (M.S.)-- Springfield College, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references.

The research was mainly confined to secondary schools in the Limpopo Province where a lack of self-empowerment amongst the educators is the order of the day. The research question of the study was generated as follows: Does the lack of self-empowerment amongst the teachers in the Limpopo Province (Region 3) have a negative impact on the development of a common self-empowerment for the teachers? The main objectives of the research were to give teachers some guidelines for efficient as well as successful self-empowerment practices for better functioning and service in secondary schools in the Limpopo Province. The hypothesis generated was formulated as follows: The development of self-empowerment by teachers which maintain good relationships with their community will result in the strong possibility that they will have fewer development problems. The research was conducted by means of a phenomenological approach. The following concepts were defined: self-empowerment, curriculum development, development for whole school curriculum development, involvement and participation. Historical perceptions of teachers and their participation and involvement were highlighted and the history of self-empowerment in the Limpopo Province was discussed. The composition of the teachers fell into two categories, namely, untrained and under- trained (as far as self-empowerment is concerned) teachers. The importance of the teachers’ involvement in self-empowerment was discussed under the following sub- headings: curriculum vision, decision making, design and development, policy-making, appointment of curriculum teaching staff and building and renovating curriculum. The principal may be involved in the self-empowerment activities through the self-empowerment committee. Principals and teachers must receive their knowledge in self-empowerment development during their training at seminars and conferences in order to play their roles in the community-self-empowerment relationships. As a result, principals will be enabled to fulfill their tasks as cooperative facilitators and as relationship establishers in the community-self-empowerment relations. For example, principals must see to it that teachers must be considered as collaborators in the self-empowerment process, since they have a strong role to play in their learners’ learning and behaviour. In the second place, principals should be friendly towards the teachers because complete frankness makes for good relationships. This, in due course, can bear fruit so that all go well that ends well to the benefit of the whole school. / Dr. M.C. van Loggerenberg

Research asserts that learner performance in South African schools is in a state of crisis. While many more learners’ post-1994 in South Africa have physical access to education, very few have epistemological access. The quality of the education learners receive is polarised along socio economic lines. This crisis has its roots in the legacy of colonialism and apartheid, and as such, there is a need to transform the education system to ensure equal opportunity for all learners, and ultimately economic growth and security for the country. One of the explanations offered for the crisis in learner performance is the poor teacher education system. However, there is a paucity of research in teacher education generally in South Africa, and specifically in relation to pre-service teachers. Furthermore, little attention has been given to how initial teacher education could contribute to the promotion of a social justice agenda with the intention of transforming the South African schooling system. This research seeks to understand how the expectations, scaffolding and assessment of preservice teachers’ teaching practices can be utilised to promote social justice during the Teaching Practice (TP) component of initial teacher education. In answering the research question, I analyse data and literature to identify a set of key valued functionings of quality praxis that preservice teachers ought to be provided the capability to realise, at the level of achieved functioning. This is a qualitative case study located in the interpretive paradigm. The case under study is: quality teaching practices of pre-service teachers. This case is bound by context (initial teacher education in South Africa) and setting (the pre-service teacher in the classroom). Two South African Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) were selected through purposive sampling and their respective Teaching Practice (TP) documentation was analysed. Focus group interviews were conducted with five lecturers involved in TP at one of the HEIs. The theoretical framework of the study used to guide the analysis of the data was underpinned by a social justice perspective on quality education. Given that a social justice perspective does not have analytic tools, I view quality pre-service teachers’ teaching practices as praxis and utilise the capability approach as a mechanism for identification and description of valued functionings and capabilities that contribute to quality praxis. There are four significant findings in my research. Firstly, there is consistency with regards to the valued functionings and capabilities across the TP documentation of the two participating HEIs. In other words, the conceptions of a capable pre-service teacher are similar. Secondly, if social justice goals are to be realised, greater clarity of the valued functionings needs to be evident in the TP documentation. Thirdly, the valued functionings can be categorised into those that are foundational and those that promote a social justice agenda. Finally, in promoting a social justice agenda, there are functionings that ought to be valued by the HEIs that are seemingly not currently valued.

The emergence of distributed leadership theory encourages multiple involvement of individuals in leadership of the school, regardless of their leadership positions (Spillane, 2006). The manifestation of teacher leadership through distributed leadership theory grants opportunities to teachers to enact leadership roles. This study explored how the notion of teacher leadership is understood, the leadership roles existing for the beginner teachers, and the constraining and enabling factors to the practice of teacher leadership in a rural combined school in Ohangwena region, in Namibia. The study is a formative intervention adopting a case study approach located in a critical paradigm since it aimed to bring changes in the activity system of the beginner teachers. The data were collected from ten participants: four beginner teachers, four experienced teachers, the principal and the Head of Department. The data were generated using the following techniques: document analysis, interview, questionnaires, observation and Change Laboratory workshops. The data were analysed thematically using second generation of Cultural Historical Activity Theory (CHAT) and Grant’s (2006, 2008, 2010) Teacher Leadership Model. The findings revealed that there were different understandings of the concept of teacher leadership. It was viewed as participation, influence, motivation and mentoring. It was also revealed that beginner teachers practiced leadership roles across the four zones of Grant’s (2006, 2008, 2010) Teacher Leadership Model, but to various extents. A high participation was noted in zone one within the classroom and zone two in curricular and extra-curricular activities and minimal participation was reported in zone three within the whole school development and zone four beyond the school into the community. Teacher leadership in the case study school was constrained by several factors, including teachers’ reluctance to lead, cultural beliefs, top-down leadership structure and lack of experience. Due to the minimal participation of beginner teachers in zone three and four, the findings suggested that the school should foster a collaborative culture, establish induction and mentoring committees in the school and encourage beginner teachers to take up leadership roles by providing opportunities for them to lead through delegation. In a series of Change Laboratory workshops (CLW) the principal and the Head of Department took up the responsibility of providing leadership training to the teachers to enable them to assume leadership roles in the school. In addition, participants agreed to establish induction and mentoring committees in the school to provide guidance and assistance to teacher leaders.

Visualisation in general and visualisation processes in particular have received much attention in the mathematics education research literature. Literature suggests that the appropriate use of visualisation helps learners to develop their conceptual understanding and skills of geometry as it allows them to visually interpret and understand fundamental mathematical and geometrical concepts. It is claimed that visual tools play an important role in communicating mathematical ideas through diagrams, gestures, images, sketches or drawings. Learning mathematics through visualisation can be a powerful tool to explore mathematical problems and give meaning to mathematical concepts and relationships between them. This interpretive case study focused on how selected teachers taught concepts in geometry through visualisation processes for conceptual understanding as a result of an intervention programme. The study was conducted at four high schools by four mathematics teachers in the Kavango East Region in Northern Namibia. The participants were involved in a three-week intervention programme and afterwards taught three lessons each on the topic of geometry. The data collection method of this research was: focus group and stimulus recall interviews, classroom observations and recorded videos. This research is located in constructivism. I used vertical and horizontal analysis strategies to analyse the data. My analytical instrument consisted of an observation schedule which I used in each lesson to identify how each of the visualisation processes was evident in each of the observed lessons. This study revealed that the participant teachers used visualisation processes in most of their lessons and these processes were used accurately in line with the requirements of the grade 8 mathematics syllabi. The visualisation processes were used through designed visual materials, posters and through the use of geometrical objects such as chalkboard ruler, protractor and compass. The results from this study also confirmed that visualisation processes can be a powerful instructional tool for enhancing learners’ conceptual understanding of geometry.

It can be argued that the Namibian curriculum is largely influenced by a Western epistemology. However, many studies suggest that learners make powerful meanings of mathematical concepts they are learning if they visualise these and experience them in relation to what they already know from their own cultural backgrounds. According to the Namibian National Curriculum for Basic Education (NNCBE, 2010), it is not only important for learners to acquire mathematical knowledge and skills, but also to develop and grow their identities, cultures and values as individuals. The aim of this study was to explore and investigate how selected mathematics teachers employ visualisation as a teaching approach to re-contextualise indigenous knowledge (IK). The study set out to explore how conceptual understanding is enhanced by participation in an intervention programme. The use of visualisation is considered an important mediating and pedagogical tool in the mathematics classroom to enhance the mathematics learning of learners. The research is informed by a socio-cultural theory of learning and is located within an interpretive paradigm. The study was conducted at four schools in the Oshana region of Namibia and involved four mathematics teachers who were purposefully selected due to their willingness to use visualisation-IK approaches in their teaching, based on their responses to the survey. The methodologies used are qualitative and quantitative case study. To gather data, document analysis, a survey, lesson observations and focus group interviews were used. The study found that most teachers in the Oshana region have an understanding of the effective use of visualisation-IK approaches. However, the study revealed that visualisation- IK approaches are mostly used in grades 4 to 7 mathematics classrooms. It also discovered that most of the visualisation approaches that teachers employed aligned well with the curriculum and promoted conceptual understanding in the teaching of mathematics. The results of the study showed that teachers have experience of the enabling and constraining factors in using a visualisation-IK approach to teaching mathematics.

M.Ed. (Educational Psychology) / This investigation is part of a group project that was conducted by a research team of the Department of Educational Sciences of the Rand Afrikaans University. The focus of this study is classroom teaching duties and educator commitment. Teaching is only successful if it leads to effective learning. In order to be successful in their teaching teachers need skills, knowledge and techniques that can be used simultaneously so that they can achieve predetermined aims and objectives. There can be no doubt that teaching is a complex task, and in order to accomplish this demanding task successfully, teacher's need to focus on different aspects in the learning teaching situation, like classroom management, classroom discipline, preparation of their lessons and the others. The research was based on assumption that for prospective and serving teachers to teach effectively and be committed to the teaching profession. In order to understand this problem in its total context, a study of the literature on classroom teaching duties and educator commitment was done.