In South Africa, the common law principle of "in loco parentis" entitles teachers, as the guardians in the school environment, to discipline learners. However, in view of new legislation advancing children's rights, it is unclear as to the extent to which teachers can or do enact the "loco parentis" role. This study employed a…

Many emerging economies are just beginning to consume digital content meaningfully. In the field of education in particular, such technology could help to narrow the gap between teacher training and the expectations of a post-colonial, post-apartheid education system in an emerging economy. However, it is important that the use of technology in…

This paper presents findings of four Grade 6 teachers' involvement as facilitators of a participatory action research (PAR) project conducted in three South African primary schools. Based on the results of Phase One research which indicated that Grade 6s learn about sexuality, Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) and Acquired Immunodeficiency…

Despite the worldwide curriculum innovations to teach English through meaning-focused communicative approaches over the years, studies report that most language teachers still follow transmission-based grammar-oriented approaches. It is known that the success of any curriculum innovation is dependent on teachers. Therefore, given that teaching…

Although becoming a more racially-integrated society, the legacy of Apartheid still affects learners' social engagements in and outside their classrooms. Adopting Nussbaum's (2010) capabilities framework for a socially just democracy, this paper examines 27 pre-service teacher education students' perceptions of a digital storytelling project and…

In this paper I analyse the potential that participatory action research holds for educating pre-service teachers to become more critically reflective and socially conscious. I also describe the rationale for and process of engaging pre-service teachers in their teacher education programme. Involving these candidate teachers in participatory…

Forum Theatre (FT), a participatory improvised theatre form, raises consciousness, enables debate and critical reflection, and encourages a democratic form of knowledge production that engages the audience in their own learning and unlearning. I used FT as a platform to understand how 15- to 18-year-old learners, in a co-educational school in the…

We argue that the "community of inquiry" approach, using reading materials modelled on Lipman's Philosophy for Children programme, is a theoretically justified and teacher-friendly means of promoting effective thinking skills. The stimulus materials, used by the pre-service teachers, consist of short stories of classroom life designed to…

Based on the existing literature on the positive relationship that exists between high instances of HIV infections and a high degree of gender injustices in southern Africa, there is clearly a need for HIV-prevention interventions, to focus on the need for changing the existing gender norms. Social change begins with change at the individual…

South Africa has eleven official languages and legally learners receive tuition in their mother tongue until the end of Grade 3. From then on teachers are required to teach through the medium of English or Afrikaans. The implication is that the majority of learners in the senior secondary school phase study Life Sciences in their second language,…

Establishing a close alignment between teacher education programmes and the realities of the actual classroom remains a challenge in preparing pre-service teachers at higher education institutions. The literature indicates that reflection is a core quality of effective teachers. We investigate how the development of reflective practice through…

Our purpose was to see if THRASS (Teaching Handwriting, Reading and Spelling Skills) is a programme that should be taught to Foundation Phase (FP) and Intermediate/Senior Phases (ISP) pre-service teachers at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology (CPUT). The term "literacy" is defined as an evolving, developing and complex concept,…

This study, using a non-experimental, exploratory and descriptive method, established learners' and educators' views about factors that contribute to poor performance in mathematics and physical science. Participants were purposefully selected from seven schools with poor pass rates in District 3 of Tshwane North. Focused group interviews with ten…