Unemployment is on the rise in South Africa. Learners who attend special schools are marginalised in the labour market. As an educator in a special-needs school (‘special school’), I noticed many learners returning to school to ask for my assistance to find them jobs. This inspired me to ask: to what extent does the special school that they attended prepare its learners for adulthood? What were the learners’ experiences and how did the curriculum prepare them for work and socialising? In order to answer this question, I used a case study methodology within an interpretative paradigm using semi-structured interviews with three educators and 17 former learners of a special school which is referred to as School X. The study was analysed through a theoretical framework that explored medical and social models of disability, curriculum (especially the enacted curriculum) and transformative learning. The analysis revealed that the learners’ transition to adulthood was problematic. They experienced their schooling and subsequent employment prospects predominantly through a medical model of disability which labelled and defined them, rather than environmental factors, as the problem. This was evident in the enacted curriculum in terms of content and educator responses, though there were some exceptions. Their social life rarely developed beyond family connections. Their experiences of contributing to transformative learning were often negative in that raised vocational prospects on entry to the school resulted in disillusionment by the time they left. Again there were exceptions, however, as some former learners highlighted individual educator efforts to positively reinforce their self-esteem and thus keep their hopes up for a brighter future. Recommendations are made for special schools to have a more appropriately designed curriculum that meets learners’ context specific needs. This curriculum both for the technical and the academic learning areas must work in conjunction with work programmes followed by industry so that these learners can fit into the work programme when seeking employment. Lessons must be designed taking the learners’ learning pace into consideration. Society, and prospective employers in particular, must be conscientised about the merits of the school and special schools in general. It is recommended that there be integration between special schools and industry, and other mainstream schools. This would make people aware of the capabilities of learners with special needs and highlight the fact that they have a place and an equal chance in society. The teachers who are involved with special education should have the appropriate training so as to be able to understand the nature of these learners and deal with them in an appropriate manner. Their training should be constantly upgraded in order to keep abreast with the latest demands of industry and employment agencies. Post-school follow-up support must be made available to former learners to offer them career guidance and to afford them the opportunity to brush up on their technical skills and familiarise themselves with the latest trends in industry. All stereotyped thinking must be removed from the school, starting with co-ed workshops rather than separate workshops for boys and girls. This would help to remove the one aspect of negativity that appears within the hidden curriculum. / Thesis (M.Ed.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2012.

Background. This study takes you on a journey back in time to the adult education offered to Blacks during the apartheid era in South Africa. It also looked at the events that had lead to the high degree of illiteracy in South Africa today. This study also ascertained the reasons for the massive unskilled workforce prevalent in South Africa in this technologically advanced age. In conducting this research on Adult Basic Education and Training (ABET) it was an imperative to visit the various countries to briefly view their ABET practices and policies. In so doing their practices and policies were compared to those implemented in South Africa. Purpose. The South African government has neglected the constitutional right of adults to basic education over the last decade (Rule, 2006). This had motivated me to enquire if the practices at ABET centres were in keeping with the policies advocated by the ABET directorate of the Department of Education (DoE). The ABET centre managers represent the DoE at their respective ABET centres. Bearing this in mind this study interrogates the roles and responsibilities of ABET centre managers as purported by the DoE’s policy documents presented to these centre managers. The collection of data for this research was achieved by concentrating on three of the core duties of the ABET centre managers in practice. These core duties were administration, managing resources and managing adult educators. In so doing data was gathered from the centre managers using the processes of observations, interviews and document analysis. This data from the centre managers was further triangulated with the data obtained from the centre educators through a method of interviews and from suitably selected documents analysed at the research sites. Conclusion. The research concluded with the recommendations that the ABET directorate needed to develop more forceful and intense developmental workshops to improve the capacity and competencies of ABET centre managers and ABET centre educators in order to improve the ABET system in South Africa. Merely presenting policy documents to these vital proponents of ABET in South Africa will not improve the illiteracy rates overnight or even over the next decade. These policy documents must be thoroughly understood by the policy implementers in order for the policies to be effected as was intended by the policy formulators. / Thesis (M.Ed.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, 2007.

The study focuses on school libraries as an integral part of the curriculum. This is an area of inquiry, which has potential to make the South African curriculum accessible among teachers and learners through collaboration with the teacher-librarian. The critical questions that guide the study are based on the role of the school library as an integral part of the curriculum and the systems, procedures and strategies that enhance the utilisation of the school library for curriculum purposes. An interpretive methodology with a case study design format is applied to investigate the questions in the context at one public high school on the outskirts of Durban. / Thesis (M.Ed.) - University of KwaZulu-Natal, 2007.

This study investigates the role of the School Management Team in curriculum / Thesis (M.Ed.) - University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2009.

During the past few decades the role and functions of the principal have undergone a radical change. Traditionally, the principal was merely the head of the school and her/his role and functions at the school were to implement policies set out by the education authorities. The principal was required to have professional training and experience to manage the school. The traditional view was that a competent educator with a certain number of years of experience, and the right personality, was well equipped for the task and the demands of principalship. This makes the assumption that the ability needed by an educational leader to perform certain administrative and managerial tasks could be developed through experience. The present study attempted to interrogate this assumption. It was hypothesized that there is a need for induction programmes and professional development programmes for newly promoted management personnel. This research was undertaken to determine the degree of managerial competence amongst principals and other senior management personnel in primary and secondary schools. The quantitative method of research was adopted. Based on the assumption that there was a serious lack of leadership competencies among senior management teams at schools and there was a need to address this problem, a questionnaire was drawn to obtain responses from both senior management teams and educators at six South African public schools, and to compare the responses of both groups to the same questions. Results of the present investigation reveal that the underlying problem of the lack of leadership competencies amongst senior management personnel lies in the fact that they have not been properly inducted into their roles as well as the lack of professional development courses. Findings from the present research emphasize the increasing importance for management training of the educational leader. This should comprise two aspects, viz., basic management training (the academic-professional component) followed by a management development programme (in-service training). Managers should be given courses in, inter alia, school management, curriculum and programme development, school law, supervision of instruction, human relations, school finance and budgeting, personnel administration, leadership, community relations, internship and field experience, child and adolescence development, psychology of learning, counselling and guidance theory and practice. / Thesis (M.Ed.)-University of Durban-Westville, 2003.

The purpose of my research was to develop an understanding of the roles of a Centre for Teaching and Learning (CTL) within higher education institutions, nationally and internationally. Also of significant interest was the role that the CTL played within the University of Durban Westville, particularly in its transformation from Resource Centre to a Centre for Teaching and Learning and how it was perceived by academic staff. I reviewed national and international literature on CTLs, how they were established, its structure, staffing, what it offered and how it functioned as a body within the institute. Most recent literature focused on international universities. It was clearly evident that CTLs in first world countries like the United States and the United Kingdom were well established. These CTLs are fully engaged within their institutions. This however was not the case in many of the South African institutions. CTLs are a fairly new concept nationally and in most cases, like that of the University of Durban Westville, the centres are not wholly integrated into the structure of the institute. In the case of the University of Durban Westville, the Faculty of Education attempted to transform its long existing Resource Centre into a CTL, somewhat unsuccessfully compared to the standards set abroad. The data for my study was gathered mainly from questionnaires that were sent to 300 academic staff at the University of Durban Westville. Additional data was collected via interviews with staff at the existing CTL and correspondence with other national institutes that housed a CTL. Analysis of the data revealed that the CTL was not properly launched and marketed within the university. Staff that worked at the CTL felt that the introduction of the CTL demanded new roles they were not equipped to handle. The staff felt that they needed training to fulfill the necessary duties demanded by a centre of that nature. Academics within the university, in most cases were unaware of its existence, what it offered or how it could be beneficial to their teaching. Data received from the questionnaires highlights the needs of a CTL but also highlights the weaknesses of the CTL within UDW. The overall study demonstrated the pivotal roles that a CTL plays in enhancing academic excellence at higher education institutions. The study made clear that in order for a centre to be successful in its outcomes, its governance, structure and funding should be an integral part of the institution. / Thesis (M.Ed.) - University of Durban-Westville, 2004

The rationale and motivation for this study was based on my personal need to try and understand the relationship between theory and practice (praxis) and the normative and empirical variables (hermeneutics) evident in my research, so as to contribute to the body of literature around learner centredness and learners' experiences of pedagogy and schooling. Review of educational studies conducted in South Africa reveals that most research is driven by 'common sense' understandings of learner centredness or what constitutes 'good teaching practice'. These studies illustrate that well intentioned but simplistic acceptance at the level of policy is hazardous and that we need to know more about practices within the classroom. Similarly, within South African policy documents, a paradox exists around the pedagogic discourse for learner centredness. The majority of education policy documents implemented after 1994 advocates a learner centred approach to teaching and learning, which is associated with weak framing over the instructional and regulative discourse while the National Curriculum Statements calls for a strongly framed pedagogic discourse. This paradox has significant implications for policy implementation at the classroom level. The objective of my study was to capture and analyse learners' experiences of Grade 3 teaching within one school context by focusing on control and regulation within the pedagogic relationship. Consequently, the research focused on the 'how' of pedagogic practice i.e. how do learners experience the transmission of knowledge through the educator's pedagogic practices? The case study involved non - participant observation to illustrate how different modalities of pedagogic practice provide for acquirers the principles for the production of what counts as a legitimate text. Bernstein's concept of framing was used to understand and analyse the locus and relative strength of control of how knowledge was transmitted, how it was received and of what may or may not be transmitted in the pedagogic relationship. The methodology employed in the research was based on developing an external language of description derived from Bernstein's internal language of description. The internal language of description was drawn from Bernstein's theory of pedagogic discourse. The external language of description provided textual pointers of specific characteristics relating to the internal framing of educational knowledge. It provided the means to identify specific pedagogic practices of educators and teaching strategies employed in the transmission-acquisition process. The findings depicted a mixture of pedagogic practices within one school context with one being based on a mixed pedagogic mode and the other on a performance pedagogic mode. The study revealed the possibility of extrapolating findings reliant on interaction with relevant literature around the framing of pedagogic discourse and the data obtained in the study. The conclusions reached in the study revealed strong framing over evaluation criteria, selection and sequencing of educational knowledge. While research has shown that weak framing over the pacing of knowledge is more likely to promote learning, the study revealed differential pacing of knowledge ranging from weak to strong. However, it was evident that learners had adapted themselves to the educators' modus operandi. Both educators in the study attempted to cater for differential learning needs of learners by the utilising different teaching strategies. The study revealed strong framing over hierarchical rule in terms of learner-learner interactions and educator-learner interactions. The research illustrated that giving learners control at the level of hierarchical rule posed a significant challenge for both educators. Both educators would make use of school and classroom rules as a means of maintaining social control. The study contributes to a better understanding of pedagogy and schooling. It makes clear that for learners to acquire the competencies and knowledge laid down in policy documents, the educator would need to make a pedagogic assessment in terms of the level of difficulty of the lesson, concepts and knowledge to be acquired and the differential needs of learners. This is more likely to increase the success of learners so that their enhancement, inclusion and participation in schooling does not become an existence of virtual reality. / Thesis (M.Ed.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2006.

This study, conducted in Uganda, was set up to observe, record and analyse the pattern of interactions among the participants of URLCODA's adult literacy programme which has taken a semi-formal intergenerational form. Inspired by Vygotsky's ideas on mediation, more 'capable peers' and the Zone of Proximal Development, it was thought that intergenerational interactions in URLCODA's literacy programme could be harnessed to maximise learning among the participants which could become an alternative model for promoting literacy across the board regardless of age, sex, race, location and social status. The main research question that guided the study was: what happens in the intergenerational interactions in URLCODA's adult literacy programme attended by children in Arua district of Uganda and what are the motivational, enabling and limiting factors in such a teaching and learning arrangement? The study, which adopted a qualitative design, used observation, interviews, documentary analysis and photography to collect data from a sample of 32 participants. These were purposively selected from URLCODA's intergenerational literacy programme. It was important to conduct the study because URLCODA's adult literacy programme attended by children is rare and has not, to the best of my knowledge, been reported on anywhere in Uganda. The study was unique because the learning relationships between the adult and child learners were the reverse of the Vygotskian concept of mediation that interested me to undertake the study. This is because in the formal literacy and numeracy skills lessons, it was the child learners who played the role of 'more capable peers' and not the adult learners. The data collected revealed that the teaching methods were conformist in nature, the learners depended entirely on the instructors for the teaching/learning and reading materials, the participants were motivated by various factors of which personal, social and economic ones outweighed the rest, such as political and environmental ones, the intergenerational interactions appeared to be beneficial to both adult and child learners who all appeared to be enthusiastic about the programme, and the greatest challenge to the programme lay in the area of lack of resources on the part of the organisers and poverty on the part of the literacy learners. The study concluded that the interaction between the adult and child learners is beneficial for exchange of ideas, experiences, skills and beliefs which helps in shaping their behaviour in the class and outside the class. The programme has serious resource limitations and design deficiencies, especially in terms of the content of the curriculum that needs to be addressed urgently. The study recommended that URLCODA should seek support from the government and charitable organisations, liase with other organisations to institute credit schemes to support and strengthen the livelihood or functional nature of the programme, solicit and provide reading materials to the learners, put in place post-literacy programmes, further develop the intergenerational nature of the programme, offer training opportunities for the instructors, balance the curriculum to ensure that the programme meets the needs of all the participants and embark on fund-raising and other resource mobilisation drives to enable the programme achieve its intended goals. Finally the study identified a number of areas for further research. These include: the assessment of the impact of such an intergenerational programme on the performance of children in the primary schools in case of those attending Universal Primary Education (UPE), the assessment of the impact of the programme on the behaviour of children outside the literacy class and whether such a learning arrangement can create a democratic situation for the two groups to freely share information for enhancing learning opportunities and promoting the concept of lifelong learning. / Thesis (M.Ed.) - University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2004.

Due to the unique nature of South African public education, it is not always viable to invest in expensive, high maintenance resources. Out of this context the Media in Education Trust (MIET) sought to provide resources that would meet the need for low maintenance resources, even harnessing the power of the educator as a resource. In 1999 the "Foundations" supplements made their appearance, featuring in certain prominent newspapers. Towards the latter part of 1999 the years work on ''Foundations'' was packaged into the ''Foundations'' pack, which consisted of 2 books and a series of 8 posters. With this in mind this dissertation was initiated by the desire to evaluate the supplement and pack and its usage. The evaluation was narrowed even further by focussing specifically on participants of a workshop held on the usage of "Foundations". The dissertation was aimed at seeing if workshop participants were motivated to use the pack and whether these had become part of their teaching practice. During the course of this research the Centre for Research, Evaluation and Policy at the University of Durban - Westville was commissioned to evaluate two of MIET's projects. The opportunity thus presented itself for the research scope to be expanded. During the course of this research data was evaluated from a MIET workshop at Berea in Durban, a workshop in Vryheid attended and a workshop in Empangeni viewed. The majority of participants viewed the workshops very positively. The questionnaires given to educators at specific schools revealed that the majority of educators are aware of "Foundations" and attempt to utilise it in some form or the other. ''Foundations'' does have a unique place in classrooms throughout South Africa. What exists as an issue is the manner in which it is brought into the fore as a valuable resource. / Thesis (M.Ed.)-University of Durban-Westville, 2001.

Teacher evaluation is a management tool for all educational organisations as it is used to research information on teacher performance. Information on teacher performance is important in the decision making process regarding employment of teachers, confirmation of appointment, identifying potential for promotion and staff development. Over the years teachers have raised serious reservations about teacher evaluation procedures in the United States of America, England and Wales and the Republic of South Africa . As a result, the United States and England and Wales have moved towards teacher evaluation intended for staff development. In this study the researcher investigated the perception of KwaZulu secondary school teachers towards teacher evaluation along the lines of the US and English system of evaluation, i.e. staff development. This study consists of three objectives. The first objective was to ascertain the perception of KwaZulu secondary school teachers with regard to teacher evaluation. The second objective was to find out whether these perceptions are influenced by personal variables of the respondents. The third objective was to determine whether teachers exhibit significant differences with regard to: purpose of evaluation, degree of independence, willingness to be evaluated, attitude toward evaluators, their involvement, and conditions under which evaluation was conducted. The researcher administered a questionnaire to KwaZulu secondary school teachers from Mehlwesizwe Inspection Circuit in urban and rural schools. Unfortunately the research sample was small but it yielded significant results. Over 71% of the respondents were positively disposed toward the evaluation of teachers for professional development, 27% were uncertain about teacher evaluation and 2% were negative. The results also indicated that perception of teacher evaluation was less likely to be influenced by personal variables such as gender, qualification, experience, area of specialization and area of operation. The majority of the respondents in the research sample have shown that the following purposes of teacher evaluation were very important: improvement of staff performance, identification of in-service training needs and the encouragement of self evaluation among teachers. Secondly, the respondents indicated that they were willing to be evaluated if they have control over decisions related to their teaching activities . Thirdly, the respondents revealed that they were willing to be involved in developing an evaluation system but lacked the necessary skills and knowledge about evaluation procedures . Fourthly, they indicated that they trust and they have confidence in their evaluators. Finally, they indicated that the decisions related to the type and use of evaluation data should be shared among all those involved in the evaluation process. The researcher made the following recommendations : ? the KwaZulu Department of Education and Culture should adopt a goal or target setting approach towards the development of the evaluation system. ? classroom observation and the evaluation interview should form part of the overall process of teacher evaluation. pre-service and in-service training of teachers and training of prospective evaluators should be undertaken in a form of seminars, workshops , conferences and a negotiated curricula be included at Universities and Colleges of Education. most importantly, evaluation should concentrate on the improvement of teaching practice. / Thesis (M.Ed.) - University of Natal, 1993.