The Pedagogical Orientations of South African Physical Sciences Teachers Towards Inquiry or Direct Instructional Approaches

Ramnarain, Umesh; Schuster, David

doi:10.1007/s11165-013-9395-5

Cited by 86 publications

(114 citation statements)

References 10 publications

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“…Teachers are therefore able to perform inquiry-based lessons as opposed to direct instructional approaches regardless of class sizes. However, the findings of the current study do not support the previous research and differ from Ramnarain and Schuster's (2014) findings that South African physical science teachers gave huge class size as one of the contextual factors which dissuaded them from performing inquiry-based lessons.…”

Section: Discussioncontrasting

confidence: 99%

“…However, teachers from schools with insufficient resources might have been elated to have relevant science equipment for the first time and indeed, they might have wanted to perform prescribed practical activities as recommended by the curriculum documents. This finding is in agreement with Ramnarain and Schuster's (2014) findings who found that availability of resources influence the methods adopted by teachers towards inquiry or direct instructional approaches.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 93%

“…The findings support previous studies that found that teachers were more likely to improve their teaching skills if PD was aligned with standards and assessments (Holland, 2005). Besides acquiring skills, the findings provide some support for the conceptual premise that inquiry-based learning emphasises learners' understanding concepts (Ramnarain & Schuster, 2014) as learners attested to understanding concepts better. Given that some learners, particularly in most South African schools, have less access and fewer opportunities to engage in inquiry-based lessons due to insufficient apparatus and chemicals, an issue emerging from this finding relates specifically to the Experimento professional development programme being able to donate science equipment and train teachers who lack relevant knowledge and skills to perform inquirybased lessons.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 59%

“…Inquiry-based education allows learners to seek evidence and construct solutions to support their reasoning (Gillies & Nichols, 2015). It also emphasises learners' understanding of concepts rather than acquiring skills (Ramnarain & Schuster, 2014). It encourages 'teachers to move away from the tradition in which knowledge is viewed as discrete, hierarchical, sequential, and fixed and towards an environment in which knowledge is viewed as an individual construction created by the learner' (Draper, 2002, p. 521).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 3 more Smart Citations

Facilitating Small-Scale Implementation of Inquiry-Based Teaching: Encounters and Experiences of Experimento Multipliers in One South African Province

Dudu

2015

Int J of Sci and Math Educ

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This paper explores the experiences of 37 physical science high school teachers who participated in a professional development (PD) programme coordinated by three Experimento multipliers. The Experimento programme is a Siemens Stiftung international educational programme aimed at providing didactic and methodological approaches to classroom experiments using an inquiry-based approach to science education. Experimento multipliers are the facilitators of the PD. The main data source comprised teacher interviews, school observation visits on classroom activities using the Experimento 10+ box and the facilitators' field notes. Findings suggest that there is a shift from the traditional approaches of science teaching to the implementation of inquiry-based teaching which was encouraged by the gradual formation of a community of practice, a reconceptualization of the term 'practical activities' as prescribed by the CAPS document, and the need for experiments which facilitate action-oriented teaching. The discussion highlights the implications of these findings for the practicing teachers' professional development and the problems of linking theory with practice in such development. The study recommends more interventions throughout the year to enable teachers to improve their skills of implementing inquiry-based teaching, content knowledge and science pedagogy as evidenced by analysis of their summative evaluation of the intervention.

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Section: Discussioncontrasting

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 93%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 59%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Facilitating Small-Scale Implementation of Inquiry-Based Teaching: Encounters and Experiences of Experimento Multipliers in One South African Province

Dudu

2015

Int J of Sci and Math Educ

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“…Many of the response patterns are similar to ours, but there are also intriguing differences to be studied. Recently in South Africa an earlier set of POSTT items, specifically for physical science, were used to assess and compare the pedagogical orientations of in-service physical science teachers practicing in township (disadvantaged) schools and suburban (advantaged) schools, and results so far indicate marked differences between the preferred teaching practices of the two groups of teachers in their particular circumstances (Ramnarain & Schuster, 2014). For information regarding the Turkish language POSTT and the Turkish English language POSTT, contact Ebru Mugaloglu (akturkeb@boun.edu.tr), and for a Korean language POSTT, contact Young-Shin Park (parkyoungshin1968@gmail.com).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pedagogy of Science Teaching Tests: Formative assessments of science teaching orientations

Cobern

Schuster

Adams

et al. 2014

International Journal of Science Education

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A critical aspect of teacher education is gaining pedagogical content knowledge of how to teach science for conceptual understanding. Given the time limitations of college methods courses, it is difficult to touch on more than a fraction of the science topics potentially taught across grades K-8, particularly in the context of relevant pedagogies. This research and development work centers on constructing a formative assessment resource to help expose pre-service teachers to a greater number of science topics within teaching episodes using various modes of instruction. To this end, 100 problem-based, science pedagogy assessment items were developed via expert group discussions and pilot testing. Each item contains a classroom vignette followed by response choices carefully crafted to include four basic pedagogies (didactic direct, active direct, guided inquiry, and open inquiry). The brief but numerous items allow a substantial increase in the number of science topics that pre-service students may consider. The intention is that students and teachers will be able to share and discuss particular responses to individual items, or else record their responses to collections of items and thereby create a snapshot profile of their teaching orientations. Subsets of items were piloted with students in pre-service science methods courses, and the quantitative results of student responses were spread sufficiently to suggest that the items can be effective for their intended purpose.

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Understanding the influence of intrinsic and extrinsic factors on inquiry‐based science education at township schools in South Africa

Ramnarain

2016

J Res Sci Teach

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This mixed-methods research investigated teachers' perceptions of intrinsic factors (personal attributes of the teacher) and extrinsic factors (environmental) influencing the implementation of inquirybased science learning at township (underdeveloped urban area) high schools in South Africa. Quantitative data were collected by means of an adapted version of the Science Curriculum Implementation Questionnaire (SCIQ) ). The adapted version was renamed the Scientific Inquiry Implementation Questionnaire (SIIQ) and was administered to 186 science teachers at township schools in South Africa. The teachers at a township school were then interviewed in order to solicit in-depth information on the findings that emerged from the questionnaire analysis. The findings highlight a lack of professional science knowledge (content knowledge, pedagogical content knowledge, pedagogical knowledge, knowledge of students, educational contexts, curricular knowledge, and educational purposes) that contributes toward teachers' uncertainty in inquiry-based teaching. Also, extrinsic factors such as school ethos, professional support, resource adequacy, and time serve as significant constraints in the implementation of inquiry-based education at the school. The data collected from SIIQ provides a foundation for understanding at a high school level how factors influence the delivery of a curriculum underpinned by inquiry. # 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 53: 598-619, 2016 Keywords: inquiry-based learning; science curriculum delivery; environmental factors One of the key imperatives in the transformation of education in South Africa is the need to provide quality education for all (Department of Education, 2001). The issues of equity and redress were foremost in transformation of the segregated education system, and the accompanying curriculum reform. The previous Apartheid education system was comprised of separate education departments for Blacks, Whites, Coloreds, and Indians, with inequitable distribution of resources for the races. Apartheid education was characterized by gross inequalities in the financing of education. Although this was reflected in all areas of school funding, the legacy of these policies is most visible in school infrastructure. A study by the Foundation for Research Development (1993) showed that the per capita expenditure for a White student was five times that for a Black students. A legacy of the apartheid policies is therefore the enormous diversity of schools in terms of the availability of physical resources. This diversity is further exacerbated by

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The Pedagogical Orientations of South African Physical Sciences Teachers Towards Inquiry or Direct Instructional Approaches

Cited by 86 publications

References 10 publications

Facilitating Small-Scale Implementation of Inquiry-Based Teaching: Encounters and Experiences of Experimento Multipliers in One South African Province

Facilitating Small-Scale Implementation of Inquiry-Based Teaching: Encounters and Experiences of Experimento Multipliers in One South African Province

Pedagogy of Science Teaching Tests: Formative assessments of science teaching orientations

Understanding the influence of intrinsic and extrinsic factors on inquiry‐based science education at township schools in South Africa

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