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Maintaining discipline in schools in the post-corporal punishment era

The purpose of this study is to look at instilling discipline of learners at schools after corporal punishment was abolished by identifying causes of disciplinary problems, alternatives to corporal punishment, and the attitudes of learners, teachers and parents towards alternatives. Data were collected through questionnaires, interviews and observation. Data were collected from learners, teachers and parents. Two neighbouring schools in the Mthatha District of Education were used. A qualitative research approach was used in the study. Findings reveal and support literature consulted that there is a wide range of causes of disciplinary problems at schools. According to the findings, the outstanding difference between respondents on causes of disciplinary problems was on home background. Learners are not in agreement with literature, teachers and parents who all agree that background is the cause of misbehaving of learners at school. The study reveals that learners, teachers and parents hold different views about alternatives to corporal punishment. While teachers, parents and literature are in agreement on using parental involvement as an alternative to caning, learners do not want parents to be involved. Teachers, the findings reveal, are not in favour of alternatives that need to be supervised by them. The final outcome of this study focuses on positive alternatives to corporal punishment. These include parental involvement, manual work, the application of school rules and enforcement of the code of conduct. Learners would also like to be disciplined and parents are in favour of being involved in the maintenance of discipline in schools.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:nmmu/vital:9548
Date January 2006
CreatorsTungata, Mfuneko
PublisherNelson Mandela Metropolitan University, Faculty of Education
Source SetsSouth African National ETD Portal
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeThesis, Masters, MEd
Formatviii, 89 leaves ; 30 cm, pdf
RightsNelson Mandela Metropolitan University

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