Curriculum Reform in South Africa PDF

# 10 Knowledge, Knowers and Knowing ## Curriculum Reform in South Africa ### Ursula Hoadley ## Introduction - The need for curriculum reform came with the transition to democracy in South Africa in 1994. - The goal was to address past inequalities and foster human rights and democracy in every sph...

# 10 Knowledge, Knowers and Knowing ## Curriculum Reform in South Africa ### Ursula Hoadley ## Introduction - The need for curriculum reform came with the transition to democracy in South Africa in 1994. - The goal was to address past inequalities and foster human rights and democracy in every sphere. - The curriculum was revised shortly after it was implemented. - The chapter focuses on the underlying logic and nature of the changes made in the reforms. ## Curriculum reform and shifts in knowledge, knowers and knowing. - The changes are understood in relation to knowledge, knowers and knowing. - Social justice has shifted from focusing on the leaner and learning to one that privileges knowledge. - The three moments in curriculum reform since the transition to democracy in South Africa in 1994 are: - Construction and implementation of a new curriculum in 1998, named Curriculum 2005. - A review of Curriculum 2005 in 2002, which resulted in the construction and implementation of a revised National Curriculum Statement (NCS). - Another substantial revision of the national curriculum was proposed in a 2009 review of NCS, and the focus is on the distinction between curriculum and pedagogy. ## Apartheid Curriculum and Pedagogy - The highly racially segregated system of apartheid had different departments of education for different population groupings based on race classification. - The 'core' curriculum was produced by white departments and adapted by other racial groupings, often amounting to a watering down of the ‘white’ curriculum. - The curriculum was content-driven, with stringent prescriptions for scope and sequencing of content. - The system's philosophy, known as Christian National Education, was a reflection of Afrikaner nationalism. - The curriculum was white- and male-oriented, emphasizing teaching based on drill and practice, with little elaboration of concepts and skills, but rather a strict focus on content. - Teachers were issued with detailed work plans and highly prescriptive teacher manuals. - The system of inspection was bureaucratic and appeared to be used vindictively and punitively against teachers. - The attendant pedagogy was known as ‘fundamental pedagogics’, which was authoritarian in nature, positioning the child as ignorant and undisciplined. - It was based on a pedagogy devoid of critique, emphasizing rote memorization. ## Curriculum reform efforts in the 1980s and 1990s - Two curriculum reform efforts. - One formed part of the range of movements against apartheid education known as People's Education. - The other was a government effort to rationalize and modernize curricula. - Both reform efforts were influenced by the developments in the USA and the UK around constructivism and progressivism. - The apartheid regime strongly controlled knowledge and knowers, informed by an autocratic theory of pedagogy and clear content selection along white, Christian, nationalist lines. ## Reform moment 1: Knowers and the conflation of curriculum and pedagogy - The shift from an apartheid regime to a democratic state in South Africa in 1994 entailed a negotiated settlement between old and new rulers. - The post- apartheid curriculum involved the eschewal of prioritizing knowledge distribution to any particular group. - It allowed for a proliferation of sites for learning and the avoidance of explicit prioritization of knowledge distribution. - This process of curriculum construction was influenced by foreign consultants promoting Outcomes-Based Education (OBE) as a curriculum alternative fostering generic skills for a new global economy. - National qualification frameworks were also influential. - This approach, termed Transformational OBE, was defined in official documentation as follows: - No thought is given to the existing curriculum. Instead schools (or local districts) can choose any content and use a wide range of teaching methods as long as these develop citizens who display the agreed-upon critical outcomes. - These critical outcomes were derived from the constitution of South Africa and described the kind of citizen aimed to be created by the curriculum, defined by broad cross-curricular, generic skills. ## Curriculum 2005 - The new post-apartheid curriculum, Curriculum 2005, was launched in 1997. - The curriculum was informed by locally (People’s Education; the integration of education and training) and globally (outcomes-based education, competency-based curriculum) developments. - It was referred to as a paradigm shift in curriculum, from the traditional apartheid curriculum to a new outcomes-based curriculum. - The new curriculum was also designed in relation to the National Qualifications Framework (NQF). - The NQF was launched in 1996 and was an attempt to create equivalencies between education and workplace learning by placing all qualifications on the same grid, and breaking them down into unit standards which could interchangeably make up different qualifications. - The strong influence of Labour and an economic discourse were evident in the emphasis on the recognition of prior learning, access and portability. - Curriculum 2005 was largely a product of Labour's call for a skills-based curriculum linked to an NQF, emphasizing outcomes, a discrete, generic, demonstrable performance required of the learner. - The curriculum had several progressive features. It placed an emphasis on group work, relevance, local curriculum construction and local choice of content. ## Critique of Curriculum 2005 - While the first post-apartheid curriculum, Curriculum 2005, was significant, it was subject to criticism, which focused on training and implementation, system failures and curriculum design. - Critics argued that curriculum was driven by policy imperatives with little conception of the realities of classroom life. - They stated that the policies developed in the first five years of democracy served to mark the shift from apartheid to post-apartheid education and establish the ideological and political credentials of the new government. - Classroom-based studies conducted on Curriculum 2005 found convergence in findings around a number of issues. - Teachers lacked the knowledge base to interpret Curriculum 2005, resulting in poor conceptual knowledge. - Teachers lacked the knowledge base to interpret Curriculum 2005, resulting in poor conceptual knowledge. - Critics argued that the curriculum led to the dominance of outputs over inputs, and that teachers were expected to select the appropriate content and design 'learning programmes' themselves. - Critics alleged that curriculum ignored the boundary between school and everyday knowledges. - The academic arguments around the distinction between everyday knowledge and school knowledge, and the implications of integration, emphasized the unequal distribution of knowledge to different students. ## Curriculum 2005 Review Report - The Curriculum 2005 Review Report, compiled in 2000, strongly recommended reduced integration and clearer specification of contents, as well as greater simplicity in the design and language of the curriculum. - The Report identified several features of outcomes-based education: - The active learner and ideas of uniqueness and difference - The active teacher who, rather than following a prescriptive syllabus, makes decisions about what to teach and how to teach it - The relative importance of activity and skills as a basis for knowing and knowledge - The relative importance of induction over deduction - Although the knower mode retreated with the review of Curriculum 2005, and knowledge was foregrounded, knowing remained pronounced. - The Report emphasized the four pedagogical aspects bulleted above, which are features of progressive and constructivist pedagogies. - The critics stated that there was some contradiction in the retention of outcomes in relation to the treatment of knowledge. - They recognized the need for greater conceptual coherence and progression, emphasizing knowledge stipulation and attention to disciplinary structure. - The Report advocated for a learner-centered approach, strongly emphasizing that educator's role was to facilitate acquisition through the selection of the appropriate knowledge. - The Report argued that the pedagogy of Curriculum 2005 followed constructivist and progressive principles. - The Report acknowledged the limitations of the constructivist approach, arguing that learning disciplinary content knowledge could be replaced by learning the procedures and methods of the discipline. ## Reform moment 2: Towards a knowledge project - The 2000 review of Curriculum 2005 resulted in a shift from knowers and knowing to knowledge and knowing. - It was a return to the focus on the ‘what’ of knowledge. - The focus shifted from the ‘how’ of knowledge to the ‘what’. - The Report emphasized the need for clearer specification of the knowledge to be learned. - Critics argued that outcomes-based education inhibits a clear specification of what is to be learnt, suggesting that outcomes be replaced with ‘clear content, concept and skill standards and clear and concise assessment requirements’. - Critics argued that the South African version of outcomes focuses on skills statements rather than content. - Critics also argued that assessment descriptors are often vague, ambiguous, difficult to measure and low in academic content. ## Reform moment 3: Subduing knowing - In 2009, the Minister of Education called for a review of the implementation of the curriculum in South Africa. - There were concerns over a persistent poor performance of South African Learners in national and international standardized tests and on-going criticism in the media of outcomes-based education. - The review committee, comprised of government, union and academic representatives, recommended a strengthening of implementation, emphasizing teachers’ experiences,. - The report made a strong call for a knowledge-based curriculum, resting on a Bernsteinian conception of knowledge structuring. - It invoked the notion of powerful knowledge, drawing upon the social justice implications of an under-specified curriculum. - The Report also took aim at the discourse of knowing, and the dominance of a constructivist approach. - It stated that while all learners engage in constructing knowledge in terms of coming to understand certain concepts, it is generally accepted that these aspects inhere within the subject and not in the minds of learners in the first place. - The Report recommends challenging the emphasis on group work in classrooms and the integrated approach, arguing that these were not ones that are privileged in official thinking. - The Report also calls for a ‘clear and concise assessment requirement’, suggesting that outcomes be replaced with ‘clear content, concept and skill standards’. - The report argues that OBE, by focusing on attitudes, dispositions and competencies, fails to give adequate specification of essential learning. - It criticizes the focus on skills statements rather than content and for the general level of specifications, which are largely generic and insufficient as a guide for what is to be learned. - The report notes the difficulty of measuring outcomes-based curriculum, which are often vague, ambiguous, difficult to measure and low in academic content. ## Discussion - The three curriculum reform moments in South Africa demonstrate an increasing emphasis on the prioritization of knowledge in the curriculum, specifically with academic disciplines, their structuring and curriculum entailments. - There is an agreement in official review reports on the social justice implications of access to disciplinary and specialized forms of knowledge. - The three reform moments show a change in the relationship between the ‘what’ and the ‘how’ of teaching and learning. - The first point concerns the issue of control over pedagogy. - It has been argued that pedagogy is ‘legislated’ through curriculum. - Teachers are instructed through curriculum prescription to deploy particular pedagogic forms in their classrooms. - The second issue relating to the conflation of curriculum and pedagogy is the difference between 'everyday' knowledge and specialized knowledge. - In everyday knowledge, the curriculum becomes confused with the specialized knowledge, leading to a dilution of what is to be learned by how to learn it. - The Bernsteinian framework draws attention to the importance of enhancing knowledge by establishing boundaries. - The chapter concludes with a reminder that curriculum must be treated as a structured act of knowledge that helps shape the knower. - It highlights the importance of understanding the distinction between curriculum and pedagogy. - It advocates for a more clear and concise approach to the curriculum, ensuring that all students have access to the knowledge they need to succeed. <start_of_image> Areas for improvement: - The content seems to be fairly dense and extensive. A clear summary section or a brief overview at the beginning of the discussion would be helpful for the reader. - It could be helpful to break down the content into more distinct sub-headings to improve the organization and readability of the document. - While the information is well-organized, there is no clear call to action. Ending with a call to action would provide a clearer sense of purpose and direction for the reader. - The document could benefit from visuals like graphs, diagrams or charts to make the information more engaging and comprehensible.