EDITORIAL

 

Editorial

 

 

Labby Ramrathan

School of Education, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, South Africa. ramrathanp@ukzn.ac.za

 

 

In this general issue of the Journal of Education the authors of papers on post-school education engage with issues of teaching and learning as well as with professional development, while those dealing with school education consider concerns related to learner performance and strategies to address this. The central focus of this issue of the journal is on teaching and learning and these papers offer various vantage points on this topic.

The digital integration of teaching and learning processes is part of an on-going research agenda, more especially in the context of the rapid innovations in technology and the concomitant skills needed. In Conceptualising a Framework for Digitally Transforming Teacher Education in the South African Context, Orhe Arek-Bawa and Sarasvathie Reddy explore the readiness of Schools of Education to embrace digital technologies in their programmes and propose a framework for such a future.

Research supervision in higher education has become, in recent times, an area of substantive scholarship, more especially in the context of increased enrolment in postgraduate students and in inducting novice supervisors. In Development of the Sisonke Supervision Mentoring Programme, Janet Condy and colleagues map new ways of supporting and capacitating novice supervisors by proposing this specific mentoring programme supported as part of a community of practice. Qualification pathways towards university degrees for Early Childhood Development (ECD) teachers, especially mature women who have studied at TVET colleges, have been very challenging. In Systemic Inarticulation as an Obstacle to the Education Aspirations of Mature Women ECD Practitioners, Kaylianne Aploon-Zokufa and Joy Papier illuminate some of these challenges through the process of narrative inquiry with these women.

In Playful Pedagogy as a Tool through Memory Work to Enhance Professional Learning and Teaching Practice, Khulekani Luthuli and colleagues explore memory-work as part of a self-study approach to educational research as they recall and reflect on their experiences as primary school learners. Through these reflections, they argue that play can serve to enhance learning.

Lizelle Naudé and Diana Breshears, in It has Given us a Title: Identity-transitions in First-generation Students at a South African University, note the conflicting demands of the westernised systems prominent on their campus and the African cultural values of first-generation students in higher education and discuss how they negotiate their personal, relational, and cultural identities.

In Multimodality and a Diverse Pedagogical Mix: Insights into the 21st Century South African Secondary School Learning Environment, Jeanette la Fleur shifts the discourse related to teachers' adoption of technology towards a broader conception of 21st century learning contexts in which the appropriation, rather than the adoption, of digital technologies is located.

The language of learning and teaching continues to be an issue of educational discourse and debate, more especially in the context of the Basic Education Law Amendment (BELA) Bill. In their paper, Khelobedu-Ll Parents' Attitudes towards Using Khelobedu as a Medium of Instruction, Tsebo Ramothwala and colleagues present parents' perspective on the use of Khelobedu, a dialect associated with Sepedi, as a medium of instruction in the Foundation Phase of schooling.

More specific to the teaching of a particular subject in schools, in Exploration of Curriculum Changes in the Learning and Teaching Methods of Economic and Management Sciences, Decorate Mathebula and colleagues argue for a range of teaching strategies to allow for the challenges experienced by learners that lead to poor performance. In attempting to understand why learners perform poorly in science subjects, Joanne Hardman and Naadira Patel, in How is the Science Concept of Force Conveyed in A Physics Grade 9 Textbook in South Africa? A Cultural Historical Analysis, analyse two science textbooks in relation to how they present relevant information. They conclude that this topic is presented in problematic ways in one textbook but adequately in the other. In exploring ways to improve mathematics performance by learners, Lovejoy Gweshe, in Mathematics Club Learners' Mathematical Identities: Narratives of Learners and their Class Teacher, proposes the establishment and use of mathematics clubs to enhance the mathematics identities of learners. He argues, through a mixed methods research design, that such identities can influence learner performance in mathematics classrooms. Recognising learning programming as a challenge among learners because of limited resources and support, Mashite Tshidi and Alton Dewa, in Towards Data-driven Interventions: Leveraging Learning Analytics to Support Programming Education for Grade 10 Learners in South African Schools, propose the use of learning analytics to determine where learners experience challenges in five key areas.

In their theoretical paper, Evolution of Classroom Languaging over the Years: Prospects for Teaching Mathematics Differently, Jabulani Sibanda and Clemence Chikiwa note that languaging, as an evolving phenomenon, offers prospects for creativity and innovation, as well as linguistic flexibility by advocating for the deployment of multisensory semiotic systems to complement linguistic classroom communication. Teaching poetry in rural schools is known to be challenging especially in English second language (ESL) classrooms. In South African Rural High School Teachers' Experiences of Teaching English Poetry, Khanyi Mbambo and Mlungisi Vusumuzi Hlabisa discuss this in relation to teachers' use of their personal, professional, and social experiences in teaching poetry.

Engaging with breathwork in singing, in a number of other areas of well-being like anxiety management, for example, and healthcare, Gert Potgieter and Ronal De Villiers, in Exploring Breathwork Concepts vis-à-vis the South African Life Skills Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement contribute to this neglected area of research.

Learner governance in From Prefect System to Student Representative Councils via Representative Councils of Learners in South African Schools: Which Representative Government is Considered the Best? is scrutinised by Thokozani Philemon Mathebula who proposes the establishment of a polity-government that expresses and secures the good of every learner.

The topic of women's leadership in education district offices is an under-studied one, as Raj Mestry and Michèle Schmidt point out in The Influence of Cultural African Traditions and Power Relations on Senior Women Leader in Education District Offices. They show how women in such leadership positions experience cultural power relations that affect them negatively.