Throughout the world, education curriculum are determined and guided by knowledge perceived as being critical for the advancement of humanity. Often such progress is indicated and determined by curriculum shaped by the ways of knowing of the dominant cultural group or languages that have achieved hegemonic status in such communities, in the process marginalizing any 'indigenous' ways of knowing as embedded in the language of other cultures. Sometimes such curriculum have little or no connection with contemporary reality. In this article I therefore argue that inclusive curricular knowledge types are critical in education in order to enable all people, individually and collectively, to progress without being inhibited by the hegemony of so-called 'scientific' knowledge. I also argue that knowledge as embedded in a language is power, and should therefore be connected to reality. Using critical social theory, I propose an alternative, inclusive treatment of knowledge types in education curriculum -open-ended inquiry -in order to level the learning field for all learners, and, in so doing, to adequately prepare tomorrow's world citizenry.
Worldwide the diverse ills in society are often seen as a manifestation of the weaknesses and poor quality of the education systems practiced, especially those founded on traditional approaches -highly disciplined patriotic regimens, with a great deal of memorisation and not much room for reflecting and questioning, in contrast to the contemporary education mission which seeks to produce free citizens, citizens who are free not because of wealth or birth, but because they can call their minds their own (Nussbaum, 1998). This paper critically explores both the basics of traditional education regimens, and the contemporary education mission as espoused by some renowned intellectuals, and concludes that a sound education system ought to cultivate humanity -a citizenry that can think critically, solve problems and apply new skills and techniques in diverse contexts, a citizenry that is knowledgeable about the care and wise use of the environment.
Open Distance Learning (ODL), both in the developed and developing countries, has become a tool for human capital development in Continuing Professional Teacher Development (CPTD). In this paper, we argue that the complex nature of the teaching and learning environments calls for radical change in the CPTD-changes enhancing knowledge, skills, attitudes, abilities and empowering teachers as lifelong critical, reflective learners. This paper is aimed at exploring the role of higher education, via the ODL, in the CTPD in the South African education system. It argues that ODL, as an alternative strategy, has potential and a pivotal role to play in effective and efficient CPTD.
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