Submitted in full compliance with the requirements for a Master’s degree in Technology: Dental Technology at the Durban University of Technology, 2009. / The Dental Technology profession in South Africa is currently undergoing a possible role transformation. In the past, Dental Technicians were restricted to laboratory work only and were not permitted to have direct contact with patients. Due to a demand for oral care, and a gap that is perceived to exist in service delivery, Clinical Dental Technology has emerged as a possible new profession in South Africa. The 1997 amendment to the Dental Technicians Act allows Dental Technicians to broaden their scope of practice through further education into the clinical aspects of the profession. South Africa is one of few countries that have an enabling legislation in terms of the recognition of Clinical Dental Technology. However, there is to date no training programme or curriculum for people who would like to practise as Clinical Dental Technicians. The three institutions in South Africa that provide training for Dental Technicians do not provide training to those technicians who would like to pursue a clinical career path. Internationally, Dentists have argued that Dental Technicians have insufficient clinical capabilities. They feel that technicians do not have sufficient knowledge and experience in dealing directly with patients, and consequently have identified a need for further training of Dental Technicians before they are recognised as Clinical Dental Technicians. The aim of this study was to evaluate educational institutions’ readiness in terms of the role transformation of Dental Technicians and to establish perceptions about the introduction of this new profession by Dentists, Dental Technicians and Dental Technology lecturers. The views of these three stakeholders have implications not only in terms of the development of a new curriculum, but were also found to raise serious concerns about the implementation of this profession in South Africa. Data was collected by means of questionnaires and personal interviews with Dentists, Dental Technicians and Dental Technology lecturers in South Africa. The responses were transcribed and then coded according to pertinent themes for interpretation purposes. The data revealed major differences in the perceptions of the proposed profession by the three sectors. This has important implications for the likely success of Clinical Dental Technology, given the need for these sectors to work together as members of the dental team. The data also reveals concerns about the type of training that would need to be incorporated into the curriculum and who would be able to provide such training. By using an overview of curriculum theory, this study also raises concerns that clinical aspects might be infused into the curriculum as simply the acquisition of additional technical skills, rather than as a significant shift in professional identity to incorporate patient care.

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Thesis (PhD (Accountancy))--University of Stellenbosch, 2006. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The accountancy profession operates within an environment that is changing at a rapid pace. It is the responsibility of the profession to ensure that all its members (including future members) meet the expectations placed on them by the users of their services. Professional accountants need to stay relevant in this changing environment that may require them to change or adapt the services they offer to their clients. It is the responsibility of professional accountancy bodies to strategically plan for these changes to ensure that members that join the profession posses the required knowledge and skills to be relevant and to stay relevant within the environment they operate in. One of the key drivers of change in the environment has been identified as the advances in information and communication technologies. Information and communication technologies have an impact on the role that accountants play in the environment (i.e. what they do) as well as on how they perform their role (i.e. how they do it). The main aim of this research was to determine if, and to what extent, students, that have completed their formal education and enter the profession as trainee accountants, possess the knowledge and skills to enable them to interact with and use information technology to be regarded as competent accountants within the South African business environment. Accountants are educated in South Africa at universities that offer programmes that have been accredited by a professional accountancy body as well as through practical training offered by training organisations. During this education process, accountants are imparted with the knowledge and skills as prescribed by the professional accountancy body so that they can join the profession as competent accountants. This research showed that there are serious shortcomings in the formal education of students regarding information technology that results in students entering the profession as trainee accountants not being competent in using information technology. The reasons for students not being competent in information technology are: • the lack of clear guidance on the IT skills required of students completing their formal education because of professional accountancy bodies setting IT syllabi that are too vague and/or concise; • ignorance of the demands on trainee accountants as to the IT skills they require to be competent in the South African business environment; and • the lack of proper IT training offered by South African universities that deliver trainee accountants that possess a limited range of IT skills that may not be relevant to the environment students will function in. Through a survey the perceptions of role-players at South African universities on the strategies that universities would have to employ to ensure that the students they deliver to profession, acquire the relevant IT skills to be competent in the use of information technology, were determined.

published_or_final_version / Education / Master / Master of Science in Information Technology in Education

There is always a gap between student learning and classroom teaching in Hong Kong education. The use of information and communication technology has made the situation even worse. It is a common practice for students to work together through digital media like Instagram, WhatsApp, opening online Chat Room and Facebook by using elements like video, music, texts and artistic photography to reflect and discuss ideas for project assignment. During the process, students can further investigate what they have learnt in lessons and construct new knowledge. However, our schools are still concentrating on text-based presentation software for teaching. Schools have been reacting slowly to the appearance of this new popular participatory culture. Therefore it is interesting to study schools’ ICT infrastructure, the digital literacy in classrooms as well as students’ individual usage behavior in digital media. From the study, we are able to realize the reasons for choosing those multimodal elements in the students’ learning as well as posting them online. Then, we can determine the relationship between the participatory culture in creating multimodal artifacts and digital divide in education among students; as well as finding out those factors which lead to the gap and enhance participatory culture in academic purpose for students. Thus, we can improve the situation of students’ learning outcome gap during the use of digital media in teaching and studying. My thesis will employ qualitative research method in case study approach. It consists of 6 students’ interviews as well as teacher’s focus group interviews of three teachers from two schools. The results show that there are different forms of technology and usage gap among the students in using digital tools. Certainly, there are several ways to overcome the barriers. / published_or_final_version / Education / Master / Master of Science in Information Technology in Education

<p>This thesis was based on a larger international comparative study called the ROSE (Relevance of Science Education) project. The study investigated the affective factors pupils perceive might be of relevance for the learning of science and technology using the ROSE survey questionnaire, and was aimed at providing data that might form part of an empirical basis for local adaptation of the science curriculum.</p>

The purpose of this study was to determine whether training had an impact on the information technology attitudes of university faculty. The study was twofold. First, it sought to determine whether training changed attitudes toward information technology among faculty at a small, liberal arts university. Secondly, a group of faculty at a similar university was used to compare the differences in attitudes toward information technology among faculty who had received training and those who had not. The research population consisted of 218 faculty from these two universities. The literature review focused on obstacles to information technology use by faculty, instruments currently available for measuring faculty attitude, methods used in training faculty to use information technology, and integration of information technology by faculty.

Change is best carried out by individual teachers, and, thus, identifying and resolving teachers’ concerns about an innovation is imperative in guiding the change process to a successful point of implementation. The purpose of this study was to identify concerns that teachers experienced when implementing the Information Technology curriculum in all intermediate schools in Kuwait and to examine the relationships among teachers’ reported stages of concern and other factors, such as gender and experience. The stages of concern, one dimension of the Concerns-Based Adoption Model (CBAM), was applied to reveal teachers’ concerns. The Stages of Concern Questionnaire (SoCQ) and a demographic survey were completed by 248 respondents. The SoCQ measures seven stages of concern that reflect three dimensions: self (awareness, informational, and personal); task (management); and impact (consequence, collaboration, and refocusing Group profile analysis revealed that teachers had four high concerns related to collaboration, personal, refocusing, and informational stages. Teachers also reported low concerns at the management and awareness stages. Both females and males reported collaboration as their greater concern. Teachers with more years of experience reported higher impact concerns. The analysis of individuals’ peak concerns revealed that the majority of the respondents were adopters of the innovation. The analysis of the first highest and second highest concerns among teachers revealed the development of three patterns of concerns: self concerns, mixed concerns, and impact concerns. Results indicated that the majority of teachers were at the mixed-concern level. With more years of experience, teachers’ concerns shifted from self to task and finally to impact concerns. The results of concern analysis are consistent with Fuller’s theory of concern development. MANOVA revealed significant differences in means between females and males at management and refocusing stages. Females had higher concerns about management; males had higher refocusing concern. However, no significant relationship was found between experience and the reported stages of concern. For successful implementation, the concerns of teachers must be resolved. The CBAM including the SoCQ is recommended to KISITP coordinators as a diagnostic tool to facilitate change and to provide appropriate staff development. Suggestions were made for future research to continue validation of the SoCQ in Arabic cultures.

M.Ed. (Education) / Please refer to full text to view abstract

D.Ed. / As a curriculum initiative Technology Education is in its infancy in South Africa. It has only recently, in 1996, been introduced as a compulsory area of learning in the school curriculum. Technology Education with its particular elements of knowledge, skills, attitudes and values is conceptually different from anything previously taught in the school curriculum. The appropriateness of methodology is of fundamental importance to the success of the subject/learning area and probably represents the most significant factor in the effectiveness of its delivery. It is clear that current approaches to learning and instruction are not geared towards the attainment of the desired outcomes in Technology Education. For example, the opportunities for knowledge construction through engagement in the cognitive processes of critical and creative thinking, decision-making problem solving and designing are overshadowed by traditional approaches to curriculum delivery. This is compounded by the fact that no instructional models, which exemplify appropriate instructional practice in Technology Education exist currently in South Africa. The aim of this study was to design and implement an instructional programme in the learning area Technology at a College of Education, and based on the findings, generate a prospective instructional model which would exemplify appropriate instructional practice and at the same time contribute towards the attainment of the desired outcomes in Technology Education. The qualitative research paradigm, using the contextual case study design was considered the most acceptable research strategy for a project of this nature. A group of 20 second year learners was observed around specific tasks comprising the programme. Data was gathered using a variety of methods, viz. direct observation, questionnaires and interviews to gauge firstly, how the learners had experienced the programme, and secondly, how the teacher educator experienced the programme. From the study it appeared that exposure to the instructional programme proved to be an empowering educational experience for both learners and teacher educator alike. In addition to widening the scope and providing opportunities both inside and outside the classroom, the programme appeared to have provided entrepreneurial opportunities for the participants of the programme. Although the instructional programme catered for knowledge construction using a variety of approaches (both behaviourist and constructivist) the most significant gain for learners seemed to have emanated from both group discussion and group work. Although it cannot be stated conclusively that cognitive development had taken place, positive interdependence, shared responsibility, social skills and enhanced learning were evident. The findings of the research provided the foundation for the design and development of an instructional model in Technology Education.