A research report submitted to the Faculty of Science, University of the Witwatersrand in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science. Johannesburg, August 2014. / The general poor performance in physical science in South Africa is a cause for concern. The
reasons for this situation includes lack of basic content knowledge by science teachers,
unprofessional attitudes, ineffective teaching approaches, lack of resources and failure to
understand the language of science by the learners. This study investigated South African
grade 12 learners’ meanings of everyday words when used in science context. The study
focused on grade 12 physical science learners from four different government secondary
schools in Johannesburg. These learners had different home languages and socio-economic
background. Data was obtained through a questionnaire given to learners followed by group
interviews with the learners. A face-to-face interview with each physical science teacher from
each school was also conducted.
This study reveals that learners face difficulties with meanings of everyday words when used
in science context as was reflected by their response in the questionnaire. The physical
science teachers from the four secondary schools were not aware that everyday words (nontechnical
words) are misunderstood by the learners when they are teaching them. As such
teachers were not explaining the meanings of these words to learners in their context of use.
Also the teachers did not know the difference between technical words and non-technical
words. The study seeks to make the science teachers aware of this problem so that they can
take time to explain the meanings of these words when teaching and this might improve
understanding of science concepts. It is hoped that if there is shared meaning of words used
in the instructional language between the teacher and learners it would improve the general
performance in physical science.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:wits/oai:wiredspace.wits.ac.za:10539/16862 |
| Date | 04 February 2015 |
| Creators | Semeon, Nasimu |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Format | application/pdf |
Page generated in 0.0019 seconds