Browsing by Author "Naicker, Rubandhree."

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Critical incidents in teachers' lives: understanding teacher be-ing.
(2014) Naicker, Rubandhree.; Sookrajh, Reshma.; Ramrathan, Prevanand.
Teachers’ lives are complex and dynamic. They find themselves in an era of new challenges and new demands. Recent literature reveals that teachers are experiencing insecurities, confusion and despair. In South Africa there has been a spate of curriculum reforms and a wave of policy changes. Added to this are the severe contextual restraints, such as large classes, lack of resources, poor school leadership, poor parental support, school violence and other social problems, such as HIV/AIDS and poverty. As teachers face these realities on a daily basis, they experience incidents that become turning points in their teaching lives and are deemed by them as ‘critical’. These are termed ‘critical incidents’. This study seeks to explore how teachers respond to these critical incidents and why they respond the way they do. The use of life history methodology allowed them to tell their stories but more than that it illuminateded how they were influenced by the contexts in which they live and work. The use of in depth interviews provided the opportunity to access their personal, professional, social and moral landscapes to reveal their lived experiences while they experienced the critical incidents. By delving deeper through the different layers of their lived realities and exploring how they interacted with and appraised the different events, their feelings and emotions were revealed. The social-psychological framework on emotions provided a frame to explore how teachers responded to the different influences, that is, the workplace influences, socio-cultural/policy influences and personal influences that came to bear on their teaching lives as they engaged with the socio-cultural milieu in which they were immersed. The study used narrative analysis, content analysis and discourse analysis to make meaning of the data. The use of multiple analysis approaches provided different lenses to interpret and understand the critical incidents. The complexities of teachers’ lives were revealed when critical incidents that were triggered by one influence provoked other influences impacting on teachers in multifarious ways. It revealed how teachers interacted with the different contexts, through their ego-identities that comprised their self-and social esteem, values, beliefs, meanings/ideas and life-goals (broader goals). The critical incidents were experienced as teachers appraised the different encounters, which resulted in either congruence or incongruence to their broader goals. An appraisal of goal incongruence led to negative emotions and an appraisal of goal congruence led to positive emotions. The thesis that emerged from the study was that critical incidents in teachers’ lives affected the teacher’s spirit. Teachers felt either inspirited or dispirited as the critical incident unfolded.
Exploring the fostering of values in a school's vision and mission through curriculum implementation in English.
(2011) Naicker, Rubandhree.; Sookrajh, Reshma.
Vision and mission statements are developed by schools to give purpose and direction to all those who work in these institutions. They also articulate the values that the organisation endeavours to promote. This case study demonstrates how an independent school fosters values in the vision and mission statement through curriculum implementation. The school offers a values education programme in conjunction with the National Curriculum Statement. This is done through the example of the English curriculum in a primary school. The challenge for the National Curriculum Statement is how to promote the goals and values of social justice, equity and democracy, by integrating them across the curriculum. The Department of Education views values development as being crucial for the personal development of the students and to ensure that a South African identity is built on values different from the apartheid era (Department of Education, 2002). The school therefore has an important role to play not only in the development of knowledge and skills of their students, but also the development of values. This study adopts a qualitative approach which is located in the interpretative paradigm. A case study approach using multiple methods of data production was used. Document analysis, observations and semi-structured interviews were used to gather rich data. The vision and mission statement of the school was analysed to determine what values are articulated in it. Six comprehension lessons of three teacher participants were observed and a semi-structured interview was conducted with each teacher to determine what values are fostered through the teaching of English. The findings revealed that the values articulated in the school’s mission statement played a pivotal role in teaching. There was a strong relationship between the values in the mission statement and teaching of English. Teachers were successful in eliciting values during their teaching by using a variety of strategies, creating a positive classroom atmosphere and being acutely aware of the importance of being good role models. The training and support received by the teachers enhanced the fostering of values. In spite of the fact that the teachers were not involved in developing the school’s vision and mission statement which was the ideology of the organisation that started and manages the school, their belief in the values programme motivated its successful implementation.