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An investigation of the teaching strategies employed by a selection of educators at an FET college to support at risk L2 tourism students

The South African education system is based on learner centred principles and encourages the development of critical thinking. This approach is reflected in the South African Qualifications Framework, which identifies critical thinking as a primary outcome of education. In the vocational Tourism programme, there is a link between the subject learning outcomes and critical crossfield outcomes. The role of the vocational college educator is central in facilitating the development of critical thinking skills of all learners. The purpose of this study was to investigate how the selected Tourism educators develop critical thinking skills of risk L2 students. I conducted the study in a selected FET College using a qualitative case study in order to gain deeper understanding of how the educators implement curriculum policy in their classrooms. This study used four data collection instruments to gain an in-depth understanding of the research topic. The findings of the study reveal that educators understand the value of teaching critical thinking. However, there is a gap between educators’ conceptual understanding of critical thinking and their instructional practice to develop critical thinking skills during classroom instruction. The findings also reveal that there are factors that hinder the development of at risk students’ critical thinking skills such as; limited English language proficiency, poor behaviour, and subject guidelines which do not provide educators with guidance on teaching critical thinking skills. The study recommends in-service training sessions that will support educators on how to teach critical thinking skills explicitly. This study also recommends the development of practical guidelines to enhance educators’ critical thinking teaching strategies. The findings of this research will assist me in improving the support that I provide to Tourism educators.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:nmmu/vital:21310
Date January 2016
CreatorsTsotso, Nosipho
PublisherNelson Mandela Metropolitan University, Faculty of Education
Source SetsSouth African National ETD Portal
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeThesis, Masters, MEd
Formatvi, 109 leaves, pdf
RightsNelson Mandela Metropolitan University

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