Teacher educators' interpretation and practice of learner-centred pedagogy : a case study
- Authors: Nyambe, Kamwi John
- Date: 2013-07-16
- Subjects: Bernstein, Basil B Education -- Philosophy Education (Higher) -- Namibia Teacher educators -- Namibia -- Case studies Universities and colleges -- Namibia -- Case studies Teachers -- Traning of -- Namibia -- Case studies Teachers -- In-service training -- Namibia Student-centered learning -- Namibia
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: vital:1954 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1008260
- Description: The objective of this study was to understand how teacher educators in a Namibian college of education interpret and practice the learner-centred pedagogy underpinning the Basic Education Teachers Diploma (BETD) program. In order to achieve this objective, a case study approach was adopted, qualitative-interpretive in orientation and drawing upon interviews, naturalistic non-participant observation and document analysis. Bernstein's theory of pedagogy - in particular his notion ofrecontextualization - offered ideas and concepts that were used to generate and analyse data. The data indicated that, at the level of description, teacher educators interpreted leamercentred pedagogy as a pedagogic practice based on weak rules of regulative discourse, or a weak power relation between themselves and their student teachers. The weakening of the rules of regulative discourse and the waning of educator authority were indicated in the interview narratives, which evoked a pedagogic context characterized by a repositioning of the student teacher from the margins to the centre of the classroom, where he or she enjoyed a more active and visible pedagogic position. Contrary to the dis empowering dynamic within classroom practice under the apartheid dispensation, the repositioning of the student teacher suggested a shift of power towards him or her. Similarly, the identification of the teacher educator as afacilitator, which featured prominently in the interview narratives, further suggested a weakening or diminishing of the pedagogic authority of the teacher educator. With regard to rules pertaining to the instructional discourse, the data revealed an interpretation of leamer-centred pedagogy as a pedagogic practice based on strong framing over the selection of discourses, weak framing over pacing, and strong framing over sequencing and criteria for evaluation. When correlated with the interview data, the data generated through lesson observation and teacher educator prepared documents such as lesson plans revealed a disjuncture between teacher educators' ideas about leamer-centred pedagogy and their practice of it. Contrary to the interviews, lesson observation data revealed that teacher educators implemented leamer-centred pedagogy as a pedagogic practice based on strong internal framing over rules of the regulative discourse. Data further indicated strong internal framing over the selection, sequencing, pacing and evaluation. The study concluded that while some teacher educators could produce an accurate interpretation oflearner-centred pedagogy at the level of description, most of them did not do so at the level of practice. Findings revealed structural and personal-psychological factors that constrained teacher educators' recontextualization of the new pedagogy. A narrow understanding of leamercentred pedagogy that concentrated only on changing teacher educators' pedagogical approaches from teacher-centred to learner-centred, while ignoring structural and systematic factors, tended to dominate not only the interview narratives but also official texts. Learner-centred pedagogy was understood as a matter of changing from teachercentredness to leamer-centredness while frame factors, for instance regarding the selection, pacing or sequencing of discourses, still followed the traditional approach. The study recommends the adoption of a systematic and deliberate approach to address the multiplicity of factors involved in enabling teacher educators to interpret and implement leamer-centred pedagogy at the micro-level of their classrooms. , KMBT_363 , Adobe Acrobat 9.54 Paper Capture Plug-in
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Ecological interaction between the introduced and native rock-dwelling cichlid fishes of Lake Malawi National Park, Malawi
- Authors: Munthali, Simon Muchina
- Date: 1997
- Subjects: Cichlids -- Nyasa, Lake
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: vital:5266 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1005110
- Description: More than twenty years ago, over twenty species of the rock-dwelling cichlid species (Mbuna) were translocated from the northern Lake Malawi, where they are endemic, to Thumbi West Island, Lake Malawi National Park, in the southern part of Lake Malawi. Among these species, Cynotilapia afra, Pseudotropheus callainos and Pseudotropheus tropheops 'red cheek' are strongly territorial, and have increased substantially in number and are widely distributed, particularly in the three to seven metre depth band of the rocky habitats at the Island of Thumbi West. It is feared that the increase in population density of translocated species (hereafter referred to as introduced species) may be at the expense of ecologically equivalent native species which could be eliminated. In this thesis the following key hypotheses have been tested: (i) that the introduced species having originated from a region of Lake Malawi which is generally poor in nutrients and introduced in an area which is richer in nutrients, would cope better than the native species during periods of nutrient scarcity which occur frequently, often seasonally in oligotrophic lakes, such as Lake Malawi; (ii) that the introduced species are fitter than their ecologically equivalent native species in the acquisition of territorial space in which they breed, feed and seek shelter, and (iii) that introduced and native species coexist by utilizing different microhabitats. Results show that: 1. the introduced species, P. callainos and P. tropheops 'red cheek' may have responded positively to enhanced nutrient availability, as they were found to have better condition factors and fecundity indices at Thumbi West Island than at sites of their origin, in the northern lake Malawi. Cynotilapia afra, P. callainos and P. tropheops 'red cheek' also maximise their life-span fecundity by starting to reproduce at relatively smaller size than the native species with which they overlap in microhabitat requirements. Similarly, their breeding peaks precede the breeding peaks of the native species with which they overlap in microhabitat requirements. Consequently, due to priority residence effects, the offspring of introduced species may have a competitive edge in the use of essential resources, e.g., refuge over the offspring of the native species whose peak-recruitment occurs later in the year. 2. There is an overlap between the introduced and native species in their microhabitat requirements. Consequently, interference competition between them for territorial sites occurs. The choice of optimal territory sites is constrained by the fact that females preferentially mate with males that defend significantly smaller holes, or crevices among the rocks, probably as a means of minimizing egg predation during spawning. 3. The population of territorial males of introduced species seems to grow exponentially, depending on the availability of suitable microhabitats, and an equilibrium between them and males of the native species may be reached. Competition for optimal territory sites seems to intensify, once the carrying capacity in a particular area has been reached, and it is at this stage that some territorial males of the introduced and native species with similar microhabitat requirements, e.g., C. afra and P. zebra, or P. tropheops 'red cheek' and its sibling native species, P. tropheops 'orange chest' displace each other. However, it seems unlikely that any of the native species which were compared with the introduced species would be driven to extinction because: (a) there is a considerable interspecific territory turn-over between the introduced and native species that overlap in microhabitat requirements. (b) Even in situations where some of the native species occur in microhabitats that are not of their preference, they occupy patches of suitable sites and are capable of breeding. (c) It has been suggested that since introduced and native species breed throughout the year and are polygamous and have intraspecifically shared paternity, they are capable of fertilizing many gravid females of their own species. Therefore, the population of native species may not be detrimentally limited by the presence of introduced species. (d) The introduced and native Mbuna species that prefer small rocks coexist in the same microhabitats, partly by feeding at different sites with different intensity and they also feed at different heights in the water column. 4. The following studies have been recommended before any management intervention, such as culling is adopted: (i). interaction between the introduced and native species in the shallow and deep rocky habitats; (ii) space utilization and survivorship of juveniles of the introduced and native species; (iii) laboratory studies to confirm the role of different nutrient regimes on the fecundity of Mbuna; (iv) the possibility of hybridization between the introduced and native species; (v) monitoring of population growth and distribution of the introduced species around Thumbi West Island should continue in order to detect their long-term effects on the native species.
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- Date Issued: 1997