Teachers sometimes fail to use previously acquired teaching skills. A review of studies which had examined the maintenance of teaching skills found that some training programmes which used skill practice and feedback on performance were successful in achieving maintenance. The present study was designed to test the effect of practice and feedback in diverse settings on the acquisition and maintenance of teaching skills. The following skills were selected for training: 1. Increasing the use of approval and decreasing the use of disapproval. 2. Increasing the use of feedback and decreasing the use of criticism. 3. Using wait-time: (a) after asking a question and before calling on a student to answer, (teacher wait-time) and (b) after a student response has finished (pupil wait-time). Repeated measures were made of nineteen student teachers teaching during a six week student teaching practice prior to the training course and again immediately following it. Ten of them, who also secured teaching positions, were observed when teaching in their own classrooms. During the training course, the subjects practised some skills until the training targets had been achieved five times in each of two settings (the 2 X 5 treatment). They practised the remaining skills until the training targets had been achieved two times in each of two classroom settings (the 2 X 2 treatment). The subjects observed one another practise and the results of these observations were used to provide them with performance feedback. There was a general training effect although there was no treatment effect for the amount of practice. More maintenance was found when the subjects became employed as classroom teachers than was observed immediately after training. More skills were maintained when there was a match between the class level being taught and the class level practised with during training. Feedback was maintained by most subjects while teacher wait-time and low rates of criticism were maintained by the fewest subjects. It was hypothesized that the subjects had previously been subjected to thousands of hours of observational learning of teacher behaviour and that a brief training course may not have had sufficient impact to counter such prior learning. It was also hypothesized that there were unidentified stimuli, context variables and sources of reinforcement controlling the performance of particular skills by individual subjects. It was concluded that future research in this field should seek to identify these sources of stimulus control.

Changes in the teacher's direction of a set of standardized class lessons were simulated by a single teacher who had been trained so that he was able to alter his frequency of use of specific teaching moves while holding constant his use of other kinds of moves. The effects of these predetermined changes in teaching behaviour during the course of the lessons were measured in terms of the level of retention and comprehension of 'target pupils' of the concepts and principles which the lessons were designed to teach. Target pupils were defined, and selected to act as experimental subjects, on the basis of their pre-experimental performance on three tests: a test of prerequisite skills, a test of prior knowledge of the topic, and the IPAT Culture Fair non-verbal intelligence test. Each experimental lesson treatment was reproduced and its effects on retention measured in at least three different classrooms. This thesis describes the results of a coordinated series of nine experiments, the last six of which were designed to measure the effects on student retention of predetermined changes in the frequency of use of specific classes of teaching moves during the oral lesson tactic. The results of these experiments indicated that student retention following the highly effective, standard lesson, treatments was dependent in part upon the number of primary questions asked (relative to the number of informing moves used), the number of reaction moves provided following pupil answers, the level of response control provided by primary questions, the level of response control provided by secondary questions, and the number of secondary response opportunities provided by the teacher (relative to the number of terminal informing moves employed). The experimental procedures employed during the investigations differed from those used during most previous studies of teaching behaviour in a number of ways. The studies made use of a single teacher specially trained to simulate the lesson behaviours typically employed by teachers and to manipulate these behaviours in predetermined ways. They made use of a lesson recording and lesson analysis procedure which enabled the characteristics of each lesson treatment to be described and reported. They made use of procedures which permitted the same lesson content to be reproduced in each experimental lesson treatment and they made use of two 'standard lesson' treatments from which all experimental treatments were derived and against which all lesson treatments could be evaluated. The studies specified in advance the population of target pupils for whom the standard lessons were designed and measured treatment effects in terms of the level of retention achieved by samples from this target population. They also provided for the replication, in several different classrooms, of each experimental lesson treatment and made use of the within replications variance, rather than the within subjects variance, as the error term in evaluating the reliability of obtained treatment effects.

Hierdie studie fokus op die taalontwikkeling en -verryking van senior kleuters in milieubenadeelde gemeenskappe. Die ondersoekgroep is 'n A:fiikaanssprekende Kleurling- en Griekwagemeenskap. Dit blyk dat die ouers in hierdie gemeenskap sekere leemtes openbaar ten aansien van bulle taalopvoedingsgedrag, wat resulteer in taalervaringsagterstande by die senior kleuters. Taalontwikkeling en -verryking is in wese "a socially mediated process" en blootstelling aan stimulerende taalervaringe bevorder begrip van taalgebruik binne die sosiale konteks. Die ontoereikende taalvoorbeeld binne die gesinne en gemeenskap resulteer in ontoereikende taalontwikkeling en -verwerwing en die senior kleuters openbaar bulle arme, ongedifferensieerde taalwereld in taaltekorte ten opsigte van taalbebeer, taalstyl en taalkode. Die senior kleuters se konsepvorming is gebrekkig en in bulle taalaanwending is bulle eerder beskrywend en konkreet-gebonde as analities en abstrak. Dit blyk dat die ouers nie bulle senior kleuters kognitief toereikend stimuleer nie, en dat uitbreiding van taalkode nie toereikend gefasilieer word nie, omdat die ouers onkundig is omtrent die benutting van toevallige leersituasies, en nie potensiele leergeleenthede skep of ontgin nie. Kognitiewe stimulasie verwys na die vaslegging van sekere konsepte en uitbreiding van taalkode verwys na die vaardigheid om juis daardie konsepte te kan omskryf, verklaar of mee te deel. 'n Uitgebreide taalkode is dus die resultaat van gereelde blootstelling aan 'n wye verskeidenheid stimulerende ervaringe. Hierdie ervaringsraamwerk word later die kleuter se venrysingsraamwerk wat by gebruik om inligting te berhaal, versoeke te formuleer, voorwerpe te benoem en gebeure akkuraat te beskryf 'n Uitgebreide taalkode is dus noodsaaklik vir latere suksesvolle leer, omdat dit die leerder in staat stel om nuwe inligting te analiseer, te sinteseer en te globaliseer. Die implikasie vir die antwerp van 'n ouerprogram is dat die ouers nie net begelei moet word ten aansien van die taalverryking van die senior kleuters nie, maar ook eksplisiet daartoe begelei te word om potensieel-stimulerende leersituasies te skep. / This study focuses on the language development and -enrichment of senior toddlers in environmentally deprived communities. The research group is an Afrikaans speaking Colouredand Griqua community. It is evident that parents in this community reveal certain deficiencies pertaining to their language-teaching behaviour, resulting in linguistic experiential backlogs in their senior toddlers. Language development and -enrichment is in essence a socially mediated process and exposure to stimulating language experiences enhances comprehension of colloquial usage within the social context. The inadequate linguistic example set by both the family and the community results in inadequate language development and -enrichment and the senior toddlers reveal their impoverished, undifferentiated world of language in deficiencies pertaining to mastery of language, style of language and code of language. The senior toddlers' conceptualization is deficient and in their language usage they are rather descriptive and concrete-bound than analytic and abstract. It is evident that the parents do not adequately stimulate their senior toddlers' cognitive abilities, and a code of language is not adequately facilitated, because the parents do not know how to derive profit from incidental learning situations and are ignorant pertaining to the creation and utilization of potential learning opportunities. Stimulation of cognition refers to the mastery and fixation.. of certain concepts, while broadening of a code of language refers to the. ability to describe, to explain, to interpret or to communicate the meaning of these concepts. A broadened and expanded code of language is thus the result of regular exposure to a wide range of stimulating experiences. This experiential framework later becomes the toddler's referential framework which he uses to repeat information, to formulate requests, to name objects and to accurately describe events. A broadened and expanded code of language is thus essential for later successful learning, because it enables the learner to analyze, to synthesize and to globalize new information. The implication for the draft of a parental programme is that parents should not .only be accompanied pertaining to the enrichment of their senior toddlers' language development, but that parents in this deprived environment also explicitly be educated to create potential stimulating learning situations at home. / Psychology of Education / D. Ed. (Sielkudige Opvoedkunde)

Hierdie studie fokus op die taalontwikkeling en -verryking van senior kleuters in milieubenadeelde gemeenskappe. Die ondersoekgroep is 'n A:fiikaanssprekende Kleurling- en Griekwagemeenskap. Dit blyk dat die ouers in hierdie gemeenskap sekere leemtes openbaar ten aansien van bulle taalopvoedingsgedrag, wat resulteer in taalervaringsagterstande by die senior kleuters. Taalontwikkeling en -verryking is in wese "a socially mediated process" en blootstelling aan stimulerende taalervaringe bevorder begrip van taalgebruik binne die sosiale konteks. Die ontoereikende taalvoorbeeld binne die gesinne en gemeenskap resulteer in ontoereikende taalontwikkeling en -verwerwing en die senior kleuters openbaar bulle arme, ongedifferensieerde taalwereld in taaltekorte ten opsigte van taalbebeer, taalstyl en taalkode. Die senior kleuters se konsepvorming is gebrekkig en in bulle taalaanwending is bulle eerder beskrywend en konkreet-gebonde as analities en abstrak. Dit blyk dat die ouers nie bulle senior kleuters kognitief toereikend stimuleer nie, en dat uitbreiding van taalkode nie toereikend gefasilieer word nie, omdat die ouers onkundig is omtrent die benutting van toevallige leersituasies, en nie potensiele leergeleenthede skep of ontgin nie. Kognitiewe stimulasie verwys na die vaslegging van sekere konsepte en uitbreiding van taalkode verwys na die vaardigheid om juis daardie konsepte te kan omskryf, verklaar of mee te deel. 'n Uitgebreide taalkode is dus die resultaat van gereelde blootstelling aan 'n wye verskeidenheid stimulerende ervaringe. Hierdie ervaringsraamwerk word later die kleuter se venrysingsraamwerk wat by gebruik om inligting te berhaal, versoeke te formuleer, voorwerpe te benoem en gebeure akkuraat te beskryf 'n Uitgebreide taalkode is dus noodsaaklik vir latere suksesvolle leer, omdat dit die leerder in staat stel om nuwe inligting te analiseer, te sinteseer en te globaliseer. Die implikasie vir die antwerp van 'n ouerprogram is dat die ouers nie net begelei moet word ten aansien van die taalverryking van die senior kleuters nie, maar ook eksplisiet daartoe begelei te word om potensieel-stimulerende leersituasies te skep. / This study focuses on the language development and -enrichment of senior toddlers in environmentally deprived communities. The research group is an Afrikaans speaking Colouredand Griqua community. It is evident that parents in this community reveal certain deficiencies pertaining to their language-teaching behaviour, resulting in linguistic experiential backlogs in their senior toddlers. Language development and -enrichment is in essence a socially mediated process and exposure to stimulating language experiences enhances comprehension of colloquial usage within the social context. The inadequate linguistic example set by both the family and the community results in inadequate language development and -enrichment and the senior toddlers reveal their impoverished, undifferentiated world of language in deficiencies pertaining to mastery of language, style of language and code of language. The senior toddlers' conceptualization is deficient and in their language usage they are rather descriptive and concrete-bound than analytic and abstract. It is evident that the parents do not adequately stimulate their senior toddlers' cognitive abilities, and a code of language is not adequately facilitated, because the parents do not know how to derive profit from incidental learning situations and are ignorant pertaining to the creation and utilization of potential learning opportunities. Stimulation of cognition refers to the mastery and fixation.. of certain concepts, while broadening of a code of language refers to the. ability to describe, to explain, to interpret or to communicate the meaning of these concepts. A broadened and expanded code of language is thus the result of regular exposure to a wide range of stimulating experiences. This experiential framework later becomes the toddler's referential framework which he uses to repeat information, to formulate requests, to name objects and to accurately describe events. A broadened and expanded code of language is thus essential for later successful learning, because it enables the learner to analyze, to synthesize and to globalize new information. The implication for the draft of a parental programme is that parents should not .only be accompanied pertaining to the enrichment of their senior toddlers' language development, but that parents in this deprived environment also explicitly be educated to create potential stimulating learning situations at home. / Psychology of Education / D. Ed. (Sielkudige Opvoedkunde)