Thesis presented for the degree of
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
In the School of Education
Faculty of Humanities
University of Cape Town, 2006 / There have been many national and provincial studies on children’s literacy levels in recent
years in South Africa. However, none has determined the teachers’ own understandings of
the core indicators of an effective reading teacher. During a preliminary feasibility study, the
researcher was surprised to discover how many under-qualified teachers there were who had a
limited professional understanding of current primary school reading instructions, approaches
and practices. To assess more accurately these experienced teachers’ perceived professional
competencies in teaching reading, the current study reports the development, refinement,
validation and implementation of a conveniently self-administered profile of professional
competencies designated the “Core Indicators of an Effective Reading Teacher
Questionnaire” (CIERTQ). The researcher (the writer) gathered and analysed theoretically
coherent feedback data from more than 1000 qualified, experienced and active reading
teachers to establish a set of competencies describing teachers’ professional understandings of
their pedagogical reading tasks. These clarified roles - as outcomes of the thesis - can be fed
back to, and integrated with, teachers attending future literacy programmes and policies in
economically developing countries, as well as serving to enable present and future teachers of
reading to self-identify and improve possible aspects of their daily classroom activities.
The present study is grounded in the social constructivist, socio-and psycho-linguistic theories
originating from the works of Piaget (1969), Vygotsky (1930), Cambourne (2004) and
Goodman (2005). Their foundational principles and literacies, together with relevant educator
competencies specified and described in the South African National Education Department’s
Norms and Standards for Educators document (2000) and in both the Foundation Phase
(Grades R – 4) (1997) and Intermediate Phase (Grades 4 – 6) (1997) were defined and then
applied to the derivation of all items in the CIERTQ.
The CIERTQ instrument evolved through three phases of validation. First, the preliminary
improvements in the questionnaire developed through seven formative versions as it passed
through successive pilot trials with different small groups of self-selected reading teachers
(teachers from grades 2 – 7, principals, subject advisors, learning support teachers, final year
teacher training students and lecturers) from 1999 to early 2002.
Phases two and three formed the major part of this research. Participants in phase 2 were
introduced to Concentrated Language Encounter (CLE), an innovative reading programme
implemented and expanded annually between 2001 and 2005, in 4900 new classrooms in 308
developing schools, in South Africa’s Western Cape region. Phase two involved further
development and refinement of the CIERTQ. Version 8 was administered to 533 reading
teachers in early 2002. It was re-administered to 360 teachers six months later. 173 of the
pre-tested teachers were present at both the pre-and repeat workshops. After qualitative and
quantitative analysis of the generated data, version 8 of the CIERTQ was improved and
version 9 was reformulated in readiness for another large-scale trial.
Phase three was the final administration of the CIERTQ, version 9, to a new relevant selfselected
study group of 144 reading teachers who were attending the 2003 National
Professional Diploma in Education course in teaching Literacy in the primary schools offered
in the Education Faculty of the Cape Technikon.
Throughout phases two and three several cautious varimax normalised factor analyses were
engaged to refine and develop the questionnaire, within the context of teaching reading in
economically developing schools in South Africa. The final instrument comprised 41 items
which clustered into eight factors or dimensions of pedagogy. Particularly prominent factors
with factor loadings between 0.50 and 0.72 were interpreted as (1) pedagogically strategic
items (which included reading for meaning and application, reading for strategy development
and other items of support); (2) reading for meaning and interpretation; and (3) reading for
socialising (which included reading for research and surveillance). Almost all of the
Cronbach alpha reliability coefficients for the eight sectors of versions 7 to 9 of the CIERTQ
varied in the range of α = 0.70 – 0.87. Finally, the responses to the items were re-analysed and
presented in relation to the foundational theories of literacy and to the South African’s
Department of National Education, Revised National Curriculum Statement (2002) to produce
an underlying coherent pattern of interpretation. Thus, overall, a valid and reliable instrument
was produced, through refined consensus, with potential for use in augmenting further literacy
research. Such future-orientated research is already a recently stated major policy focus of the
current Minister of Education in South Africa for the years 2006 – 2009.
This study presents a unique contribution to knowledge. The CIERTQ appears to have wide
validity for primary schools that operate with multilingual reading cultures and diverse
reading approaches, particularly in economically developing regions of South Africa and
possibly beyond.
The investigation makes recommendations for modifications to policy in terms of (a)
introducing minor reform to the existing learning outcomes and (b) formulating an additional
five new assessment standards for the South African’s Department of Education, Revised
National Curriculum Statement (2002) Home Language document. For policy writers it may
be useful to study the emergent well-defined sector names of the CIERTQ which convey a
broader and a more holistic understanding of reading than those expressed in the policy
document.
The findings of the study answer the key research question: “Is it possible to develop, refine,
validate and implement a profile of professional competencies of effective reading teachers
for the South African context?” The answer is clearly in the affirmative, thereby
corroborating and consolidating the current literacy theories of Cambourne (2004), and
Goodman (2005) and the South African Norms and Standard for Educators (2000) document
in South Africa’s unique educational context at the commencement of the 21st century.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:cput/oai:localhost:20.500.11838/1974 |
| Date | January 2006 |
| Creators | Condy, Janet |
| Publisher | Cape Peninsula University of Technology |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Rights | http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/za/ |
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