The following two excerpts present the views of the leaders of two major
teachers’ organizations as they expressed them in 1994. They are extracts
from brief articles commissioned for a publication that attempted to
describe and discuss the education scene in the first year of South Africa’s
new democracy.
This reading from "Being a Teacher" focuses on protecting teachers' own interests, but that it should not be at the expense of their obligations to their pupils.
In this brief excerpt, Fullan and Hargreaves identify what they think
characterizes professionalism in teaching. They argue that it is not so
much the possession of a certain level of qualifications or status, nor the
possession of a set of technical teaching skills. Rather, it is the full
acceptance of the moral responsibility that is attached to the role of
teachers today, and the ability to make minute-by-minute professional
judgements in complex and uncertain situations.
One of the most important means of ensuring professional accountability
among teachers in South Africa (and of ensuring that such accountability
is administered by teachers themselves) is the Code of Conduct of the
South African Council of Educators (SACE). Introduced in 1997, the Code
establishes the basic standards by which teachers’ professional conduct
may be judged. Note that the Code provides teachers with many positive
guidelines on professional conduct as well as purely prohibitive rules.
This excerpt comes from an Education Labour Relations Council resolution
published in 1998. It is essentially a job description for South African
teachers.
The ELRC’s Teacher Appraisal policy is another important means by which
teachers’ professional accountability can be assured in South Africa. Note
the important emphasis on teachers’ professional development rather
than on simply judging teachers’ performance.
Reading 10 is a brief extract from a report in which researchers Christie
and Potterton describe the key factors that they found in those South
African schools that demonstrated resilience in the face of difficulties. This
excerpt focuses on only one of these factors: a shared sense of
responsibility on the part of the teachers on the staff – a moral
responsibility that goes beyond accountability and prevents teachers
from seeing themselves as victims, or as helpless (both of these selfimages
are hostile to the idea of teachers as professionals).
In this brief article, Professor Morrow states strongly that teachers are
central to the transformation of education and the reconstruction of
society in South Africa. But in order to carry out this role, teachers
themselves must rediscover their special professional responsibilities, and
come to see themselves as agents, not as victims.
All professions are required to be accountable in various ways for the
quality of the service they render – to their clients, to the public and to
their fellow professionals. In the article from which this excerpt is taken,
the writer analyses five forms of accountability that may operate in various
institutions in a democratic society. Only two of these forms are applicable
to teaching on a regular, day-to-day basis. A third form – legal
accountability – comes into effect from time to time when a teacher,
school, or education department is held to account in a court of law as a
result of legal action, perhaps on the part of parents.
Possibly the most significant professional choice that teachers make
(consciously or unconsciously) relates to how they see their responsibilities
as people in authority. In this note, originally written for a University of
the Western Cape study guide, Professor Morrow tries to help teachers
understand this authority role.
In order to do so, he introduces a number of significant distinctions. Some
of the most important of these distinctions are those between power and
authority (that is, legitimate, democratic authority); between political
authority and educational authority; and between control and
discipline.
Teachers often confuse authority with power, to use the distinction made
at the beginning of Reading 11. Probably the most common means of
wielding power (for teachers) has been the use of corporal punishment.
The following extract was taken from a two-part article in The Educator’s
Voice, published by SADTU. Vally briefly analyses some of the reasons for
the popularity of corporal punishment among teachers in South Africa.
Corporal punishment is of course now illegal in South Africa (as it is in
many countries). However, it still has many supporters among teachers
and parents.
Vally goes on to summarize a number of different research findings that
indicate that corporal punishment has few, if any, educational advantages.
Even if you feel inclined to question the research, the question remains:
should professional teachers advocate a practice upon which so much
doubt has been cast?
In this edited extract, Andy Hargreaves explains how the momentous
changes in the world in the last few decades have also changed the way
we think. The author talks about a ‘modern’ world and a ‘post-modern’
world. What does he mean by these terms?
With all the talk of teaching towards the achievement of competency and
skills in the wake of outcomes-based education in South Africa, it is easy
to forget that these should not be taught in a vacuum, or to the exclusion
of other forms of knowledge. In addition to knowing ‘how to’ do
something, we also need to ‘know that’ (content knowledge) and know
how to form a judgement about issues (values and dispositions).
In this article, Mark Mason, one of the authors of this module, argues that
it is vital to integrate all three forms of knowledge – propositional
knowledge (‘knowing that’), procedural knowledge (‘knowing how’), and
dispositional knowledge (knowing what our purpose is and whether it is
good).
The GICD material is thematically presented mathematical content (in line with C2005 thinking) with separate learner’s material and teacher’s guides. The learner’s material has background information necessary for the completion of the activities which is concisely presented prior to each activity sheet. Activities are primarily mathematical but some of them are purely thematic. The teacher’s guides begin with C2005 introductory notes. These notes are followed by notes for teachers relating to each unit in the learner’s material. The teacher’s notes give information on time required for the activity, resources needed, class organisation suggested, unit outcomes, unit activity outline and activity solutions. There were four Grade 7 sets of materials that we thought may still be useful
