I am employed by the Department of Education as a Senior Education Specialist, / Thesis (M.Ed.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2009.

The establishment, restoration, enhancement and maintenance of the Culture of Learning, Teaching and Service (COLTS) in a school, remains a precondition for a successful Education System. Colts aims at restoring functionality in the schools with the view to improve the quality of learning and teaching activities. The COLTS campaign programmes were launched in February 1997 by the then President Mandela, to promote a culture of learning, teaching and service in every institution in the country. From the National to Circuit level the focus is directly or indirectly devoted to the Culture of Learning, Teaching and Service in a school. The Culture of Learning, Teaching and Service promotes the idea that it is the duty of educators to teach and of learners to learn. The question is how Learning, Teaching and Service structures, processes ensure viability with the application of a Viable System Model (VSM) in a school The Viable System Model is a powerful diagnostic tool to promote viability in an organization. Therefore, the Viable System Model is applied as a methodology for understanding structures and processes of learning and teaching in a school. The application of a Viable System Model in the context of learning and teaching is used as a consistent intervention tool to develop the organizational competence. The application of a Viable System Model as an intervention tool in managing the Culture of Learning, Teaching and Service becomes a powerful learning experience or challenge for schools. The core business of any school organization is learning and teaching; thus its mechanisms for identity and viability determine survival and success. This demands that the learning and teaching programmes or approaches need to adapt to the changing environment and the new approaches require a new way of thinking, research and learning. Therefore, the Viable System Model is applied as a methodology that is capable of improving performance in a school as an organization. It is used as a diagnostic tool to check the culture of learning, teaching and service structures and processes to ensure viability and effectiveness. The culture of learning, teaching and service context explores the usefulness of VSM in dealing with complex situations in the organization. The aim is to use a Viable System Model to improve synergy between learning and teaching autonomy of parts and the whole school. It is hoped that the usefulness a of Viable System Model in the culture of learning, teaching and service context will develop a school's competence. The restoration of COLTS is a challenge to both the Education System and school community. The VSM is applied at different levels of COLTS to make specific recommendations, taking into consideration the internal and external environment. The VSM theory is used to pinpoint the various systemic or structural constraints within and outside the school. For schools to succeed as adaptive goal-seeking entity, they need understanding and application of VSM. The relevance of VSM theory such as the idea of recursion, cybernetic principles and arrangement of functions at different levels provide organizations with flexibility they need to survive in complex changing environments. Through the application of a Viable System Model, schools are encouraged to learn and understand how change unfolds through circular patterns of interaction rather than linear patterns. The discord or common faults, constraints and harmonising elements in the COLTS scenario reveal that the relationship between school and the environment should be understood as ongoing processes that need to be maintained. Therefore, the COLTS activities should meet the business idea of the organization and the principles of viability. To achieve learning and development in COLTS context, schools need to practice new behaviour skills and integrate new skills into new ways of thinking and doing. The school has to seize the opportunities created by the process of using a Viable System Model as a tool for maintaining COLTS in school. In conclusion, personal living model and the Toulmin Argument Model are included as part of systematic management, reflection and learning experiences. The models are a self-reflective process of how I can deal with COLTS issue in my organization which becomes an on - going process for personal and school as an organization to develop into new thinking horizons in COLTS context. / Thesis (M.Com.)-University of Natal, Durban, 2001.

As learners progress through the educational system their interest in mathematics diminishes. Although mathematics is designed to challenge learners, it has produced a high number of failures. Mathematics is most often measured by speed and accuracy of learners’ computation with little emphasis on problem solving and pattern finding. Whilst there are not many opportunities for learners to work on rich mathematical tasks that require divergent thinking as well. Such an approach limits the use of creativity in the classroom and reduces mathematics to a set of skills to master and rules to memorise. In doing so, causes many learners to become anxious and apprehensive. Thus their curiosity and enthusiasm for mathematics disappear, as they get older. Keeping learners interested and engaged in mathematics by recognising and valuing their mathematical creativity may reverse this negative tendency. 97 learners from Riverview High School took part in the study. Three different instruments were used to collect data: Mathematics Anxiety Scale (MAS), Personal Report of Communication Apprehension (PRCA-24) and a focus group interview. The MAS questionnaire was used to measure the level of mathematics anxiety experienced by the learners. The PRCA-24 questionnaire is a self-report measure of communication apprehension. The underlying factors were established that were influential in determining the levels of maths anxiety and communication apprehension in individual learners. The results of the study suggest that learner’ ability and attitude played an important role that would lead to the large failure rate in mathematics. Analysis and interpretation of the findings lead to the following conclusions being reached: (a) perceptions of mathematics as being a difficult subject (b) learners negative attitude in mathematics (c) fear for the subject, (d) learners self-efficacy beliefs in mathematics, (e) peer behaviour and (f) teacher behaviour. The research study findings suggest that learner’ ability and attitude played an important role. These attitudes contribute directly to the existence of maths anxiety and communication apprehension in learners which impacts on their academic performance. The results of the study suggest that learners experience varying levels of maths anxiety and communication apprehension that impacts on their performance in Mathematics, which are barriers to learning mathematics. / Thesis (M.Ed.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Edgewood, 2011.

Assessment of clinical learning as a process for determining competence in practice is one of the underpinning principles of establishing and measuring student progress III nurse education. Literature reviewed for this study revealed that assessment of clinical learning in nursing education has been a problem for many years in the profession and it still is even today. This study was therefore aimed at investigating the current methods of assessing clinical learning used in nursing education institutions specifically as these relate to the South African Qualification Authority {SAQA)'s call for applied competence. The study was an exploratory descriptive survey. Data were collected through the use of questionnaires. Questionnaires were mailed to those institutions that were not easily accessible owing to their geographic location and questionnaires were delivered by the researcher to the geographically accessible institutions. All nurse educators employed in five nursing colleges, two university nursing departments and one technikon in KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) were asked to participate in the study. The total number of nurse educators in the above-mentioned institutions was 195. The return rate of completed questionnaires was 56%. The results of this study revealed that the Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE) and continuous clinical assessments were the two methods currently most commonly used in nursing education for assessing clinical learning, The results also revealed that triangulation of assessment methods of clinical learning was prevalent in nursing education institutions, with the OSCE and continuous clinical assessments being the most favoured combined strategies in assessing clinical learning. Very few participants mentioned the non-traditional clinical assessment methods (such as the triple jump and portfolio assessments) as strategies of assessing clinical learning that were used in their institutions. This study also revealed that continuous clinical assessment as a method of assessing clinical competence allowed nurse educators to assess applied competence and was generally believed to provide a more valid, reliable and realistic form of assessment. Continuous clinical assessments were also favoured for their authenticity because they were undertaken in a real clinical setting. Within the era of outcomes-based education, the focus in assessment moves from judgmental assessment methods to developmental assessments with extra emphasis on authentic and integrated assessment methods. / Thesis (M.N.)-University of Natal, Durban, 2003.

This thesis explores the origins of occupational therapy in South Africa and how its birth, at the end of the Second World War, in a post-colonial era, with an emerging apartheid government, gave rise to an epistemology that was flawed from the start. It was flawed by virtue of its origins within a Eurocentric, paternalistic and male dominated health milieu which itself was strongly under the influence of the reductionistic and prescriptive medical model. It was flawed by virtue of the unnatural and oppressive nature of the country’s governance at the time in which everything, including health care, was designed primarily to benefit those of European descent and disadvantage those of any form of brown skin descent. It was flawed in that it did not collaborate in the design of curricula and research with the very people it served, namely, people with disabilities and black South Africans. Using historical and other relevant documentation, own life experiences, focus groups and the narratives of people with disabilities as data, this thesis attempts to expose the flawed layers described above and exactly how this impacted upon the epistemology of occupational therapy in South Africa. It also explores the changing face of occupational therapy globally and locally as a changing interface between what was then, what is becoming and what has to become in the future. The thesis ends with a flexible model that has multi-dimensional properties that provide multi-dimensional possibilities both in portraying the historical influences upon professional development and in plotting identity and curricula changes. It suggests some inherent principles essential for restructuring the occupational therapy identity and curriculum to meet this identity. It draws sustenance from the resilience that the developing South African occupational therapy profession has displayed, despite all these odds, and attempts to reconcile the errors of the past with the fast-changing face of modern day occupational therapy as it relates to professional practice, theory, contexts, policy and research in South Africa today. / Thesis (Ph.D.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, 2007.

This thesis investigated the role that folklore can play in contemporary environmental problems. This research was prompted by people living around the Mantrombi nature reserve in the Nebo region of Limpopo province who showed and interest in reviving folklore as an education model to combat their existing environmental problems.

Thesis (MFamMed)--Stellenbosch University, 2014. / BACKGROUND:Family physicians are trained to enable them to staff community health centres and primary care hospitals. Part of this training is teaching them procedural skills for anaesthetics and surgery. Knysna hospital is a training facility for family medicine registrars and this article aims to evaluate if sufficient learning opportunities exist in Knysna hospital’s theatre to teach family medicine registrars procedural skills. METHODS:A descriptive study was undertaken of the number and type of procedures performed in Knysna hospital theatre for a one year period, and compared with the required skills,as stipulated in the national training outcomes, for the discipline. RESULTS:Three thousand seven hundred and forty one procedures were performed during the study period. Anaesthesia was the most common procedure, followed by caesarean section. There were adequate opportunities for teaching most core skills. CONCLUSIONS: There were sufficient opportunities for a registrar to be taught all the core skills that are exclusive to theatre. Further research is needed to evaluate Knysna hospital as a training facility for all procedural skills. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Geen opsomming beskikbaar.

This study investigates teachers‟ experiences in identifying learners with learning barriers in one primary school in the East London District. It focuses on diversity and inclusive education as well as practices and procedures within the school. This is a phenomenological study conceptualized in terms of social constructivism(Leatherman, 2007), Kurt Lewin‟s Field Theory(Neill, 2004) and ecological systems theory(Maddock, 2000).The literature review encompasses four focal points: conceptualisation of inclusive education, inclusive education in South Africa, policy implementation, and lessons learned from inclusive education implementation both internationally and in South Africa. A qualitative research method is employed in this study through the use of semistructured interviews and observations. The findings are analysed using content analysis. The key findings of this might help the teachers working in full service or mainstream schools to have a good understanding and a sense of what diversity and inclusive education entails. The findings might attempt to examine how educators manage inclusion in the classroom, their competencies and the strategies they need in order to be competent inclusive teachers. Recommendations are developed that point to how practices could be put in place to facilitate an effective implementation strategy for the development of an inclusive education system.

This study looks at aspects of the development of environmental education in South African National Parks (SANParks), in relation to the emergence of national and organisational policy frameworks. In order to put current environmental education practices into context, the study firstly looks at the historical development line of environmental education in SANParks, as well as in the broader national context. This provides a framework within which the processes of change and development can be traced in terms of social, political and economic influences on an international and national front. The study finds that the promulgation of legislation, including the Constitution, National Acts and various other policies, reflected the trends of thinking and set the pace in a democratic South Africa, which led to the emergence of more explicit processes and refined policies. Popkewitz’s finding, that education emerged in modernity, is used in the study to illustrate this tendency. It finds that these changes in South Africa resulted in the establishment of more structured environmental education processes within SANParks, and led to the expansion, diversification and strengthening of environmental education as a field of practice over time. The study traces significant processes of recontextualisation of international and national environmental education related policies according to the framework established by Bernstein (1980). These processes of recontextualisation were followed in the formulation processes of SANParks policy and strategy documents in the period from 1999 to 2005, and resulted in an official pedagogic discourse for environmental education in SANParks. The study establishes a second level of recontextualisation, that is, the official pedagogic discourse of environmental education in SANParks is recontextualised to a pedagogic discourse of reproduction. The pedagogic discourse of reproduction relates to park practices, where contextualisation within park-based programmes appears to be strong. The park-based programmes resemble a ‘curriculum in practice’, which brings us to Cornbleth’s critical curriculum approach. The study utilises this approach to explore and explain the meaning of the critical perspective taken on curriculum construction and change efforts at park implementation level (Cornbleth, 1990). The study finds that the contextualisation of park programmes and practices lead to variety in park programmes, which adds richness to environmental education programmes and activities, and further highlights the fact that environmental education practices are prolific in national parks. The study also finds that historical and contextual processes associated with specific parks strongly characterise environmental education programmes and practices in those parks, and that partnership programmes, such as the Kids in Parks programme, contribute towards, and enhance the growth of environmental education as a specialised field of practice in SANParks. The study comments on the need for environmental education practices in SANParks to be reviewed and expanded in line with the contemporary approach towards the environment as a social construct of interacting components. These components include the biophysical, social, economic and political dimensions. The study also highlights the need for the recognition and acknowledgement of the long, historical development line of environmental education in SANParks in order to build on established structures in a holistic way. The study further determines a need for strong leadership to successfully expand this specialised field of practice and encourages a participatory approach in the review and further development of this field of practice in SANParks. The study ultimately finds that environmental education in SANParks has a long and rich development profile, which has placed it in a strong position for further development. However, it concludes that there is a great need for a rejuvenated approach, which requires expert knowledge, professionalism and broad based networking approach to enable meaningful expansion within this specialised field of practice.

This study set out to investigate the role of values in educational leadership. The renewed interest in values in both educational and corporate environments in South Africa places new pressures on members in leadership positions especially in school life. Schools are described as the ‘nurseries’ of values. The understanding of the abstract nature of values, as well as instrumentalising and implementing values in vision statements and organisational life, poses challenges to present and future school leaders. This study, based in the interpretive paradigm, is an in-depth investigation into the role of values at a former model C primary school in the Eastern Cape. Through the use of observations, document analysis, focus groups and interviews as data collection tools, this research highlights the importance of values in school leadership and how this impacts the life of the school leader. This case-study research combines theoretical and contextual frameworks to question the nature of values in leadership and uses the real-life experiences of these school leaders to resonate with current understandings of values in leadership and organisational culture. The importance of understanding these complexities in the lives and experiences of these school leaders cannot be underestimated. My findings highlight the tensions between leading successful schools (task/person efficiency) and remaining congruent with the need for leadership for social justice in post-apartheid educational institutions. The uniqueness of the school environment (‘families’ and ‘communities’) is also featured and resonates with previous literature. Through the lens of emerging leadership trends, we discover these school leaders’ understandings of values in their daily lives: they do what they are and this is reflected in this school’s unique organisational culture, which could be said to ‘transcend’ present leaders’ influence. Finally I propose that further research is necessary in order to broaden our understanding of the unique role of values in educational leadership in South Africa.