As an education practitioner I had taken cognisance of the existence of a gap in the professional development of academics at the exemplar higher education institution where most lecturers were novices in facilitating and assessing learning. I adopted the Whole Brain® Teaching and Learning Model by Ned Herrmann (1996) to transform our teaching practice. The model calls for innovative methods of facilitating learning. I adopted participatory action research to transform our teaching practice. In a community of practice, 10 novice lecturers between 35 and 50 years of age who had taught in higher education for 10 years and less implemented the Whole Brain® Teaching and Learning Model. The study’s aim was to promote a scholarship of teaching and learning in the higher education setting. I formulated the primary question: How can my fellow-lecturers and I as a collective use the Whole Brain® Thinking Model to transform teaching in higher education in Zimbabwe? A mixed methods approach was used to obtain various thoughts and views about Herrmann (1996) Whole Brain® Model of transforming practice. Diverse learning opportunities which included: different questioning techniques; various learning activities and different media were adopted. The Herrmann Brain Dominance Instrument® (HBDI®) data was used as baseline study to determine our thinking style preferences; while student feedback questionnaire data was used to evaluate the learning opportunities. Interviews, focus group meetings that were video - and audio-recorded were used to solicit qualitative data. Quantitative data was analysed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences version 23 and qualitative data was analysed using deductive thematic analysis. Results from the HBDI® report affirmed the diagnosis of our thinking preferences. The results showed that lecturers inspired students by their enthusiasm for work (73%); lecturers initiated learning by providing opportunities that reflected real - life situations (70%); lecturers promoted cooperative learning (71%). Students also contributed to their learning by developing a greater sense of responsibility (66%). The results of the two examinations were skewed towards the A and B quadrants. The general observation was that Whole Brain® methods of facilitating learning and the skill of setting Whole Brain® examinations were lacking. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2019. / Humanities Education / PhD / Unrestricted

My research provides an account of evaluating my mentoring practice using an Action Research design complemented by a mixed methods approach and the Hermann Whole Brain® Model (Herrmann, 1995). I explored how I can transform my mentoring practice using the principles of Whole Brain® thinking and how I can contribute to enriching the professional development of academic staff. My research has proceeded from an innovative idea and existing practice as an asset-based approach (Du Toit, 2009). By utilising an Action Research design my research articulates the construction of my understanding of mentoring of other academic staff in their professional practice. I followed a constructivist approach as used by Piaget (1952, 1970) that is considered an appropriate epistemological underpinning of Action Research. My research design shows thinking style flexibility as an action researcher in that I have drawn on each quadrant of the Whole Brain® Theory as developed by Herrmann (1995). This enabled me to construct meaning with my peer mentees through the assessing of practice-based evidence, engagement and reflection. As my goal in mentoring is to assist in developing independent reflexive practitioners, I have chosen to use the constructs contribute to and catalyse to express my awareness that responsibility for professional development remains with the individual and that a mentor is not the only source of professional development in the context of a Private Higher Education Institution. I have found that my peer mentees have differing thinking style preferences and varying professional experiences that required of me to engage with each in distinct ways to support the development of their professional practices. I position Whole Brain® Mentoring as a practice of mentoring that utilises multiple strategies for professional learning, both formal and non-formal, to engage the thinking preferences and disinclinations of mentees to catalyse the professional development of both the mentor and mentees. Many of my peer mentees perceive themselves as mentors, both of students and, in some cases, of other academic staff (our peers) as well. There is evidence that I utilise multiple strategies to facilitate professional learning and contribute to the professional development of peer mentees and that they have contributed to mine. My research provides evidence that I have become a more reflective practitioner, able to transform my Whole Brain® Mentoring Practice. / Dissertation (MEd)--University of Pretoria, 2014. / tm2015 / Humanities Education / MEd / Unrestricted

Higher Education lecturers in Mozambique are witnessing a chain of transformations within this sub-system including expansion of institutions, diversity of offered courses, huge admission of students resulting in more diverse student populations and the need to introduce new methods of facilitating learning and research as response. These changes, along with the rapid increase of the body of knowledge, challenge lecturers to improve themselves as academics. Contemporaneous models of professional development view this process as a constructive and situated endeavour, which should be practice-, problem-, value- and evidence-based and have reflection as its essential element. Having considered these aspects, I formulated the following research question: How can we promote critical reflection on innovative practice contributing to professional development of academic staff in Mozambican Higher Education Institutions? In order to address this research question, I adopted action research complemented by a mixed-methods approach. Therefore I carried out a baseline study entailing the administration of semi-structured interviews and questionnaires on innovative practices of lecturers. This baseline study aimed at mapping the field concerning practices to promote professional development, employment of Learning Style Flexibility (LSF) and the adoption of tools for reflection by lecturers. LSF is an approach to facilitating learning drawn from the whole-brain model of Ned Herrmann. It calls for adopting strategies of facilitating learning associated with the entire brain, not relying solely on the promotion of left brain learning. I adopted action research to monitor my practice of facilitating learningshops as an experimental professional development intervention and animated mentoring sessions to support and assist lecturers’ professional learning. Such professional learning consisted of lecturers implementing LSF within their practice of facilitating learning and monitoring this process by means of their small-scale action research. In this way I was putting into practice a synchronous model. As data collection techniques I employed the Herrmann Brain Dominance Instrument (HBDI), photography and audio- and video-recording of learningshops and mentoring sessions. Audio-recording the sessions I could collect the lecturers’ reflections. Later on, I analysed such reflections as nested within the lecturers brain profiles, pursuing a model of Learning Style Flexible Reflection (LSFR). Findings of the baseline study show the need to have a more organised and functional model of professional development in Mozambique, the need to explore the potential for scientific research through the adoption of a number of measures, as well as the need to promote lecturers’ reflection, deepening the use of tools already being employed in the context. Apart from this, this baseline information showed that the principles of LSF are not employed in a balanced and consistent manner since most lecturers indicated to facilitate student learning through strategies linked to the left brain. The action research findings show that the learninghops that I promoted with my hybrid group appeared to be effective in promoting lecturers’ critical reflection. In involving lecturers in this experimental professional development programme I promoted the possibility for them to account for what they were doing in their lecturing practice in a scholarly way. Therefore action research appeared to be the appropriate process to follow within the context of my mentorship. Moreover, action research proved to be the self-reflective inquiry lecturers can employ in pursuit of explanations for their transformative lecturing practices in the pursuit of ways to show that they are successfully working according to their values, and that their efforts are useful to improve their situations and institutions, since they are grounded within the idea of promoting reflection on one’s practice. All these aspects were evident from the lecturers’ case studies reported in this study. One of the main findings of the study is that the analysis of lecturers’ reflections, as nested within their brain profiles, and informed by the literature review, showed the emergence of LSFR, where lecturers could present different patterns of reflection associated with the different brain quadrants / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2013. / gm2013 / Humanities Education / unrestricted

Education programmes of the previous education departments in South Africa were based mainly on individual achievement and competition. In the new Outcomes Based programmes there is a shift to interaction, shared knowledge and the mastering of a variety of interaction skills. Ned Herrmann’s (1996) theory about the complexity of the human brain, the MI-theory of Gardner (2000b) and Sternberg’s (1997), Litzinger and Osif’s (1993) view of thinking and learning styles form the theoretical framework of this study. This research focuses in the first place on the way that students experience group work and co-operative learning, secondlyon what facilitators know or do not know about MI (multiple intelligences), co-operative learning and groupwork and how they implement the principles in their planning and during contact sessions. The research problem is: To what extend do facilitators in higher education make provision for the learning style preferences and other individual differences of learners during contact sessions facilitated by means of group work and/or co-operative learning? How do the learners respond to these approaches? This mixed methods research is done through observation, semi-structured interviews, a diagnostic questionnaire and a content analysis of study documentation. Study documentation was analysed to determine to what extend facilitators provided for learners’ learning style preferences and other individual differences. The behaviour of teacher training students was recorded over a period of three months and in different group settings. Participants completed a diagnostic questionnaire and the data obtained were compared with their behaviour to determine if there is any correlation between certain learning styles and behaviour patterns. I found that although the questions and assignments leave room for the learners’ differences, there is no reference to MI and learning styles in the study documentation. The theory of co-operative learning and group work is addressed in die study documentation. Learners with high interpersonal intelligence scores participated spontaneously in group activities and co-operative learning. Contrary to this the intrapersonal learners responded in a negative way. Personality clashes, conflict, prejudice, etc. were resolved to a great extend by changing group combinations. Nevertheless, the intrapersonal learner maintains a negative response towards group activities and co-operative learning. There was little or no significant negative behavior observed from learners with high scores in the other seven intelligences according to Gardner (2000b). The outcome of the first contact session led me to the conclusion that co-operative learning and group work are valuable facilitating strategies on the basis of shared sources, knowledge and progress in learning activities. Although the facilitators used these facilitating strategies, I could find no evidence that they took learners’ preferences and differences into account during contact sessions. However, in the interviews it became clear that they are enthusiastic to learn more about MI and learning styles and ways to plan and facilitate according to that knowledge. Facilitators need to know the learners in order to accommodate their diversities in group activities and co-operative learning. Learners, on the other hand, need to know their own abilities, intelligence and learning style preferences. The teaching profession is complex and continuous renewal and amelioration are essential to ensure dynamic and effective learning. / Dissertation (MEd (Curriculum Studies))--University of Pretoria, 2006. / Curriculum Studies / unrestricted