Beginner Teachers in South Africa pptx

This report focuses on the perceptions of beginner teachers about themselves, and the perceptions of school managers about beginner teachers, after the first three years of teaching in p

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Tables and figures viPreface vii

Acknowledgements viiiExecutive summary ixAcronyms and abbreviations xii

Conceptual framework 3 Literature review 5Summary 7

Introduction 9Research questions 9Research design 9

3฀ Data฀presentation฀and฀analysis฀฀฀฀17

Data from beginner teachers 17Discussion of data from beginner teachers 19Data from school managers 23

Implications for policy-makers and school managers 42

References฀฀฀฀47 contents

Tables

Table 2.1 Sampled schools by phase 12Table 2.2 Sampled schools by former education department 13Table 2.3 Beginner teachers by province and gender 13

Figures

Figure 2.1 Location of sampled schools 12Figure 2.2 Beginner teachers by race and gender 14tables฀and฀figures

The Teacher Education in South Africa series is produced as part of the Teacher

Education Programme (TEP), funded by the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands from 2005 to 2008

The programme took place at a critical juncture in the development of teacher education in post-apartheid South Africa Since 2004, sustained attention has been given to the improvement of teacher education consequent on the revision of the curriculum and the restructuring of higher education In October 2004, the Council

on Higher Education initiated a review of teacher education programmes On 26 April 2007, a National Policy Framework for Teacher Education and Development was gazetted This provided the basis for a new system of teacher education and development for a new generation of South African teachers

The TEP emerged within this overall context of enhanced attention being given

to the improvement of teacher education Its overall goal was ‘to contribute to the knowledge and information base for policy formulation and implementation regarding the organisation and practice of teacher education, with a particular emphasis on initial teacher education (both pre-service and upgrading), as well as the professional development of school leaders and managers’ (CEA et al 2005: 4)

The work was organised under four major themes: teacher supply and demand;

institutional culture and governance; the development of education management; and literacy and teacher development

The programme was designed by a consortium of agencies with considerable expertise and experience in the field: the Centre for Education Policy Development (CEPD); the Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC); the South African Institute for Distance Education (SAIDE); the Centre for Evaluation and Assessment (CEA)

at the University of Pretoria; and the Education Foundation Trust (EFT).1 The TEP was developed in consultation with stakeholders such as the national Department of Education (DoE), the Ministerial Working Group on Teacher Education, the Deans’

Forum and the Council on Higher Education/HEQC, amongst others Briefing and consultation continued through the process of research, for the consortium as a whole and in relation to specific projects

Michael Cosser, HSRC Organisational Manager, Teacher Education Programme

We would like to thank Matselane Tshukudu and Sharon Flemmit for their help with fieldwork administration and Thobeka Mda, Linda Chisholm and John Pampallis for their valuable suggestions to improve this report and for helping to bring it to finality

We alone remain responsible for all errors of fact and interpretation We are also grateful to the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands for their financial support.acknowledgements

This report focuses on the perceptions of beginner teachers about themselves, and the perceptions of school managers about beginner teachers, after the first three years

of teaching in public ordinary schools Since teachers contribute much to learners’

educational achievement and should partly be held accountable for poor learner performance, researching especially beginner teachers is necessitated by the growing realisation that a high number of them leave the profession in their early years of teaching The government’s investment in subsidising initial teacher training translates into a waste of resources when new teachers resign from teaching or if new trainees

do not take up teaching positions

This study aimed to cover a wide section of beginner teachers in a number of provinces because it was established that studies on beginner teachers in South Africa are generally small-scale and fall within the realm of postgraduate studies

at universities (mainly master’s and doctoral theses) They are also restricted to one province and, within that province, to a single district and only a few schools (Koeberg 1999; Lochner 1993; Van Vuuren 1989)

The study of beginner teachers included an investigation of the perceptions of principals and heads of department (HoDs) about the skills and knowledge of beginner teachers The study also sought to evaluate efforts by individual schools and

by district, regional and provincial education offices to support and assist beginner teachers in their work The evaluation was informed by observations that found that without the necessary support (mentorship, induction programmes), many beginner teachers develop burnout symptoms in a short space of time

Research questions and design

The key research questions aimed at beginner teachers were:

• What are beginner teachers’ perceptions of their skills, knowledge and competencies as beginner teachers?

• What are beginner teachers’ perceptions of their work experience after the first, second and third year of teaching experience?

• Did beginner teachers’ higher education prepare them adequately for the teaching profession?

The key research questions aimed at principals and school managers were:

• What are the perceptions of principals, deputy principals and subject heads of the skills, knowledge and competencies possessed by beginner teachers?

• What do school managers see as key challenges facing beginner teachers?

• What in the views of school managers should be done to enhance beginner teachers’ skills, knowledge and competencies?

• What should be done to retain beginner teachers within the education system?

The study drew extensively from survey research A questionnaire was developed and administered However, given the nature of the study (focusing on beginner teachers’ skills, knowledge and competencies), the survey instrument was augmented with a qualitative component as responses about skills, knowledge and competencies

of beginner teachers needed to be probed and elaborated on The study therefore combined both qualitative and quantitative research methods

The study covered teachers in the Free State, Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal, Mpumalanga and the Western Cape These provinces were selected on the basis of earlier research that showed that they were hiring new teachers in higher numbers in relative terms

to the other provinces (Crouch 2001) While turnover patterns have stabilised in the interim, at the time of this study these provinces still had the greatest potential to absorb beginner teachers in both urban and rural areas

Findings

Analysis of the data indicates positive comments about the current sole provision of teacher education by universities Research participants noted that some universities offer good teacher education programmes, while others do not The data showed that many of the participants had no problem with the duration of teacher education programmes Most were satisfied with beginner teachers’ content knowledge

(theoretical knowledge of the learning area or subject they teach) For many, however, the pedagogical knowledge of beginner teachers was an area of concern and it was suggested that the final year of teacher education should be set aside for teaching practice to give teacher trainees enough practical experience of working

in classrooms Overall, beginner teachers’ quality of teaching was not considered problematic

As with beginner teachers’ content knowledge, the data showed that most of the school managers have no reservations about beginner teachers’ assessment practices This includes their assessment strategies and whether they are able to use assessment

to improve teaching and learning

Besides assessment, the research findings dealt at some length with support provided

to beginner teachers, noting that most research participants were not aware of any support specifically meant for beginner teachers Some schools, through their school governing bodies, raise funds for the induction and mentoring of new teachers, while other schools, predominantly in rural and township areas, do not have support structures and programmes for beginner teachers

It was noted that salary incentives, sufficient teaching and learning resources and well-paced educational changes would contribute to beginner teachers staying in the profession

An interesting area is the confidence beginner teachers expressed about their classroom teaching ability Beginner teachers were confident that they were more than adequate in lesson preparation, content knowledge, making key concepts explicit to learners, relating content knowledge to everyday experiences, helping learners to engage with texts, and creating a stimulating classroom environment This was in contrast to findings reported in similar studies, and by school managers Possible explanations for the contradictions were explored, for example, that beginner teachers may feel pressure to be seen to be coping; the teaching experiences may be threatening beginner teachers’ sense of self, and portraying competence may be a coping strategy; teachers may perhaps not be capable of self-reflection in the early stages of their career; or the teachers may genuinely be competent when they start teaching but the schools may erode their confidence and competence, reducing them to incompetent, inexperienced teachers

Both beginner teachers and school managers reported the challenge of ill discipline

in schools Beginner teachers also expressed the desire to learn more in this area

Managing classrooms and the ill discipline in schools is a challenge for both beginner and experienced teachers However, this challenge is more pronounced for beginner teachers, who have not yet developed discipline-management strategies and may still

be struggling to assert their authority early on in their career

School managers, probably as a result of their experience, had concrete ideas on how young teachers could be supported to succeed in the profession Those same school managers, however, are not necessarily providing the needed support or even facilitating beginner teachers’ access to that support when it is not within the school

The school managers also tend to point fingers at the DoE and its officials for the unfavourable teaching conditions beginner teachers are exposed to This is because some of the school managers were also once enthusiastic young teachers but have now become disillusioned about their profession or their employer, and are therefore not in a position to motivate and mentor young teachers

The education system in South Africa does not have formal structures, policies and strategies for teacher retention Some schools and provinces, especially those

in urban areas, by virtue of their proximity to resources, easily attract teachers, as opposed to rural provinces and schools that struggle to recruit and retain qualified teachers

Implications for policy-makers and school managers

The findings call for:

• differentiated intervention programmes and strategies to tackle the problems experienced by beginner teachers;

• the fleshing out of school- or district-based beginner teacher support, with the primary aim of ensuring that these teachers teach well and stay in teaching;

• the national DoE to set clear targets and how these can be achieved;

• the DoE to invest substantially in the twin roles of the school managers (being

an instructional and an operational leader at the same time);

• the DoE to continue its training course for all school managers to improve their management of schools;

• longer immersion in practical teaching;

• the DoE to come up with implementable intervention strategies as well as ensuring the monitoring of proper implementation and support;

• the DoE to put in place programmes and plans for the periodic assessment of the impact of educational changes on teachers;

• efforts to ensure that learners in poor contexts have competent teachers;

• the prioritising of issues of equality and equity in education;

• a multi-sectoral approach to pool resources with other government departments, notably the departments of social development, health, and arts, sports and culture;

• a high premium being placed on the constant and continued investigation of teaching and learning, including teacher competency

acronYms฀and฀abbreViations

CEA Centre for Evaluation and Assessment CEPD Centre for Education Policy DevelopmentDoE Department of Education

EFT Education Foundation Trust EMIS Education Management Information SystemsHoD head of department

HSRC Human Sciences Research Council IQMS Integrated Quality Management Systems PERSAL Personnel and Salary Administration SystemSAIDE South African Institute for Distance Education SGB school governing body

TEP Teacher Education Programme

This report focuses on the perceptions of beginner teachers about themselves, and the perceptions of school managers about beginner teachers, after the first three years

of teaching in public ordinary schools

Beginner teachers are defined as newly qualified teachers who have recently joined the profession and have less than four years of teaching experience This conceptualisation is informed by studies which point out that the transition phase (initial years of teaching) is recognised as an important segment of a teacher’s career, believed to have long-term implications for teaching effectiveness, job satisfaction and career length (Hebert & Worthy 2001) Older teachers in their late thirties were excluded (see discussion in the methodology section in Chapter 2) This posed a potential problem in the South African context where a considerable number of newly qualified teachers do not get teaching posts immediately after completion of teacher education These teachers are now being absorbed into the system although they qualified some years ago As noted, this study attempted to exclude such older teachers It is difficult to distinguish between older teachers who qualified years back and are only now entering the teaching profession and those of the same age group who have been teaching for a few years, especially if they are employed on

a temporary basis In order to make this distinction, many years of Personnel and Salary Administration System (PERSAL) databases are necessary and special software programmes will have to be written to detect whether teachers appear in databases from previous years

School managers include principals, deputy principals, HoDs and subject heads

The study is premised on the pivotal role teachers play in improving the quality

of education offered to all learners Teachers are key agents in the provision of

a quality education system and, as the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation notes, without teachers, education for all by 2015 would

be an unobtainable dream and ‘any process that attempts to improve the quality

of education, promote peace and harmony and eliminate discrimination requires teachers’ (Unesco 2005a: 1) Given the critical role teachers play in the education system, attempts to improve education (learning outcomes) should necessarily include a study of the teaching profession There is also a need to take into account the growing body of research (Ball et al 2005; Darling-Hammond 2000; Osgood &

Self 2003) that affirms a positive correlation between teacher competence and learner achievement scores, that is, teachers who have a deep understanding of their subjects

or learning areas and instructional strategies are associated with high learning outcomes

Teacher competency is increasingly seen as critical if all learners are to derive benefits from the schooling system It has been found that in many developing countries, learners benefit less from education due to the poor quality and quantity of instruction (Unesco 2005b) While many countries have made great strides to achieve universal access to education for all their children, the quality of education is suspect,

as reflected in test scores (Unesco 2005b)

Since teachers contribute much to learners’ educational achievement and should partly be held accountable for poor learner performance, researching the teaching profession is thus appropriate and timely in the South African context Researching the teaching profession, especially beginner teachers, is also necessitated by the growing realisation that a high number of them leave the profession in their early years of teaching A case in point is the United States of America, where it has been found that ‘a third of beginning teachers quit within their first three years on the job’ (Stansbury & Zimmerman 2001: 1) O’Brien et al (2007) cite Ewing (2001) and Ewing and Smith (2002), who claim that teacher attrition is a major problem in Australian schools and that between 20 per cent and 50 per cent of beginner teachers leave the profession in the first three to five years In England and Wales, it was found that between 5 per cent and 8 per cent of teachers leave the profession prematurely (Smithers 1990 cited by Macdonald 1999) In the Czech Republic, many graduates leaving faculties of education do not search for teaching jobs (Vlckova 1999) This was confirmed by Hebert and Worthy (2001), who cite the 1996 Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development report that as many as 25 per cent of Czech Republic graduates of teacher education programmes elect not to enter the teaching profession.

In South Africa, it has been found that teachers under the age of 30 tend to resign

in significant numbers in comparison to older teachers (ELRC 2005) Samuel (2002) notes that where there are available job prospects in the broader economy, beginner teachers tend to leave the teaching profession in higher numbers When new

teachers resign from teaching or if trainees do not take up teaching positions, the investment by government in subsidising initial teacher training translates into a waste of resources There is also a need to factor in the glaring impact of the HIV/AIDS pandemic, which takes the lives of a considerable number of teachers – largely

in poor communities (Shisana et al 2005) – and the resultant challenges of filling the vacant posts due to death While there are no official figures from the DoE on teachers who have left or who leave annually to take up teaching posts overseas, it seems a significant number of teachers have emigrated from South Africa since 1994 (Appleton et al 2006; De Villiers 2007; De Villiers & Degazon-Johnson 2007; Manik 2007) When all these factors are taken together, they signify challenges to teacher supply

Many countries, including South Africa, are confronting mounting problems of teacher supply and this raises important questions about the strategies that governments across the globe devise to retain beginner teachers and ensure that they improve their teaching capabilities and competencies It is therefore troubling, from the perspective both of enhancing educational quality and optimising the resources spent in preparing new teachers, that many governments across the world do not invest enough in beginner teachers’ earlier years of teaching In the case of Ghana, Akyeampong describes the situation as follows: ‘rather sadly, there is a total lack of commitment by the education establishment to the early years of the beginning teachers’ professional

• A high number of new teachers need to remain in teaching, both to ensure continuity and renewal in the teaching profession and because some governments invest substantially in their professional training (initial teacher preparation)

• New teachers need to be supported in order to enhance their teaching skills, knowledge and competencies

Paying attention to teacher competencies can serve, on another level, as a way

of tackling the perennial problem of educational disadvantage that characterises

so many societies Educational disadvantage, apart from being determined in material terms – what certain schools lack and the poverty of many learners – should additionally be conceptualised in the sense of the quality and quantity of instruction given to learners: whether teachers are able to facilitate access to the specialised knowledge of the school – what is termed ‘epistemological access’, a notion popularised by Wally Morrow (2007) Where the quality and quantity of instruction is highly compromised, often as a result of teacher incompetence, it can safely be concluded that inequalities in education are still being perpetuated

In a nutshell, the competency of the teacher goes a long way towards reducing educational disadvantage in terms of epistemological access The skills, knowledge and competencies of beginner teachers should be such that they facilitate access to school knowledge and help improve educational outcomes and achievement These ideas informed the decision to conduct a study that investigated the knowledge and competencies of beginner teachers in South Africa

Conceptual framework

Voice discourse provided the conceptual framework in this study, which illuminates the plurality of voices and critiques of the voice discourse as applicable to beginner teachers’ voices and school managers’ voices

Voice discourse

Voice discourse has a long history and, given the narrow confines of this study

on the views (voices) of teachers and school managers, its trajectory cannot be exhausted here Only its essential components will be dealt with The discourse of voice emerged out of a critique of the dominant quantitative mode of investigation founded on claims of objectivity and rationality, which viewed other methods of enquiry as less objective and credible Proponents of the discourse (postmodernists, feminists, so-called third world scholars) argue that the dominant method of

investigation is rooted in particular histories, classes and social milieus It is seen

to be predominantly western, male and middle class, and excludes other ways of viewing phenomena These other ways are regarded as less authentic and credible because they are largely based on the experiences of certain actors

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Young (2000: 528) summarises the position of voice discourse as follows: ‘Voice discourse asserts the claims of experience and the equal validity of the perspectives

of all groups, whether expert or not, on the grounds that claims for knowledge,

to be in some objective sense independent of the social position of the knower, are untenable.’ The fundamental position of voice discourse is to recognise that knowledge and truth claims are inescapably rooted in social activities, forms of life or practices, and this privileges experience in knowing phenomena

Plurality of voices

The analysis of voice discourse suggests a plurality of voices even within the same category of people, for example, within a group of principals or teachers This results from the divergent backgrounds and contexts from which actors come (Hargreaves 1996) It is thus important to bear in mind that even if we talk about the voice of principals, that voice should not be viewed in homogeneous terms The contexts that affect principals’ voices in particular ways may be the districts in which they work, the professional associations they are part of and the overall economic well-being of the area or location, such as the suburb Some contexts create knowledge and experience that is liberating, while others create knowledge and experience that

is limiting (Hargreaves 1996) For example, it is expected that the experiences of principals in suburban schools will be somewhat different from the experiences of their colleagues in rural communities The voices of principals in a particular location

do not embody qualities that are generic to all principals across different contexts Thus the issue of the context in which the research participants live has a significant bearing on their experiences

Young (2000: 526) claims that experience forms the ‘foundation of all knowledge and therefore the basis for claiming that all knowledge or truth claims are equivalent, whether they derive from common sense, folk tradition, laboratory-based scientific research or systematic, disciplinary knowledge’ The position taken in this study on beginner teachers is that lived experience is central in knowing phenomena, hence the study creates space for the voices of school managers – from their experiences with beginner teachers, based on observation of their lessons and going through their files – as a source for understanding the skills, knowledge and competencies of beginner teachers

Voice discourse, like all other intellectual projects, has been and continues to

be critiqued; one of the main criticisms levelled against it relates to the issue of relativism (a situation where everything goes) In encouraging different voices to be included in the production of knowledge, the end product of voice discourse will amount to taking all voices as meritorious and credible in themselves and this will lead to relativism This will make it difficult to figure out how to improve things,

as there is no agreement about a yardstick Young, who to some extent supports the argument presented by Moore and Muller (1999), suggests that ‘in rejecting the claims for any kind of objective knowledge, the logic of their [voice discourse theorists’] position is nihilist and leads to the cynicism of social scientists who reject the grounds of their practice or, in the case of Baudrillard, give up social science altogether’ (Young 2000: 534) Being nihilistic means the agents have lost a sense of purpose and development The position of nihilism can be taken further to a point where researchers see no point at all in any social science or philosophy

Literature review

There is a wide range of literature pertinent to this study, which led to a wide literature review The literature reviewed mainly covers entry into teaching, the supply of teachers and the life of a teacher The factors considered to affect how teaching is experienced, especially by a beginner teacher, are: proficiency of students enrolling for teaching, initial teacher education programmes in higher education, transition from university teacher trainee to a classroom teacher, teacher support and induction programmes, challenges for beginner teachers, location of the school, the status of the teaching profession, and perceptions of principals and other school managers about beginner teachers Not all of these factors are dealt with in this study

Teacher education programmes

As reported earlier, the reviewed literature covered the broad area of entry into teaching, which includes training of teachers The literature on beginner teachers identifies the substance and relevance of teacher training programmes and courses

as an area of concern, in addition to the quality of Grade 12 learners (matriculants) taking teaching as a career It is suggested that some teacher education programmes fail to prepare teachers adequately for their teaching task A concern was raised by the Ministerial Committee on Teacher Education about the way beginner teachers are being prepared for the realities of the classroom: ‘A major misgiving is that overly theoretical courses are failing to turn out teachers of value and substance’

(DoE 2005b: 16) The main problem, therefore, is the content of teacher education programmes; this content is largely theoretical and says little about the practicalities

of everyday classroom life The argument is not to discard the theoretical orientation

of the teacher education programmes, but to balance this with practical teaching skills

A view gaining currency in Australia, according to Kevin Donnelly, director of consulting group Education Strategies, is that the

approaches to teacher training [should] focus as much on analysing how education supposedly reproduces social inequality as it does on teaching teachers how to teach Teachers are there to critique mainstream society and to fight for greater equity and social justice (Donnelly 2005)

Much emphasis is therefore placed on issues of equality and equity rather than

on how to assist a new teacher to teach well; teachers are trained to critique the dominant practices prevalent in the broader society rather than to teach well In other words, schools must work at several levels to redress injustice in society

6

Former teachers, Stanulis and Thornton (2000), in retrospect, recognise the limitation

of their teacher education programme, suggesting they were not adequately prepared

to manage diverse classrooms They also note that teachers today are being asked

to teach technological and analytical skills to learners from a broad range of backgrounds, to prepare them to read and write at sophisticated levels, to think critically, and to apply their knowledge to solving real-world problems (Strong & Baron 2004) Teacher education programmes do not adequately prepare new teachers for their expanded roles In short, the skills teachers need to develop are both

complex and demanding (Borko & Livingston 1989 as cited by Strong & Baron 2004)

From teacher trainee to classroom teacher

In addition to the limitations of initial teacher education programmes in keeping up with classroom realities, it has been found that the transition from university teacher trainee to practising teacher is fraught with difficulties It should not be assumed that initial teacher preparation will enable the teacher trainee to smoothly adjust and adapt to the teaching conditions at a real school The shift from being a university student to being a classroom teacher in most cases is a dramatic one It has been suggested that some aspects of teaching effectively are best learned on the job during the induction period rather than in teacher preparation (Feiman-Nemser 2003), which implies that however thorough teacher preparation may have been, the transition from teacher trainee to practising teacher needs to be carefully handled

In defence of teacher training programmes, it can be argued that beginner teachers have legitimate and specific needs that cannot be grasped in advance or outside of the contexts of teaching In other words, teaching skills (teacher competency) are developed fully through teaching in a specific classroom No university course can teach a new teacher how to blend knowledge of particular learners and knowledge

of particular content in decisions about what to do in specific situations For instance, the handling of disruptive behaviour highlights part of the gap between a teacher trainee and a practising teacher, as it has been reported that experienced teachers generally handle this kind of situation well, while beginner teachers struggle (Feiman-Nemser 2003) While trainees will have been taught about classroom management and discipline, the reality of the classroom brings concrete challenges

Additionally, the challenge that beginner teachers face relates to the uncertainty of teaching itself As some education researchers observe, teaching is to a large extent

an uncertain practice Segal (1998) maintains that teachers cannot be absolutely certain in advance about how the lesson will develop and what learners will gain from it Ayers (1995) concurs with Segal and states that the preparation a teacher gets from curriculum guidelines and supervision does not guarantee success in teaching Unique classroom situations, teachers’ personalities and values, and choices made all make teaching very uncertain The uncertainty of teaching practice has to do with the fact that teachers manage multiple and often contradictory goals at the same time, and this poses considerable challenges to all teachers, particularly beginner ones

Teacher support and induction programmes

A number of studies (Ellsworth & Monahan 1998; Freiberg 2002; Hebert & Worthy 2001; Roerig et al 2002) observe that most beginner teachers are thrust into

classrooms (a new territory for most of them) without the necessary support and mentoring Some analysts note that new teachers are expected to sink or swim without the required support It was observed that, through trial and error, new teachers develop a repertoire of teaching strategies This haphazard process of strategy development may take several years, by which time many struggling, unprepared beginner teachers have already left the classroom (Freiberg 2002)

Drawing from career and technical education literature, it is suggested that the best way to support, develop and cultivate an attitude of lifelong learning in beginner teachers is through a new teacher induction programme focused on teacher training, support and retention In Ruhland and Bremer’s (2002) study, beginner career and technical education teachers reported that personal support from other educational professionals in the form of a mentor or peer support group was key to staying in the teaching profession

According to the National Framework for Teacher Education in South Africa, ‘the

practice of launching novice teachers into employment without explicit on-site induction is unsatisfactory’ (DoE 2005b: 16) The report makes the point that newly qualified teachers are not supported through a critical induction into the world

of schooling, and may become easily disillusioned and/or develop practices that replicate poor-quality teaching and learning (DoE 2005b) The core argument is for the national DoE to come up with systems and programmes, at the school or at district level, to support beginner teachers Put differently, beginner teachers cannot

be expected to fulfil all their teaching responsibilities without some support and assistance It is thus encouraging and commendable that the draft policy document

on teacher education and development released for public comment by the national DoE states, among other pertinent issues, that the Ministry of Education will ensure that ‘systems are developed for [the] induction and mentoring of new teachers’ (DoE 2006: 13)

The key challenge, therefore, is to implement induction programmes so that teachers are kept in the classroom long enough to gain command of content and methods, and develop a ‘conditional instinct’ to guide learners and their learning

Summary

In the reviewed literature, the study area of beginner teachers starts from the profile

of teacher education students Although not dealt with in this report, a major area

of study encompasses who the new entrants are to education programmes at universities and colleges of education In our literature review, we noted reservations and concerns about teacher education programmes in institutions tasked with

the professional preparation of teachers There is a feeling from some quarters that teacher education programmes are too theoretical and far removed from the experiences of classroom life Others have argued that the teacher education programmes cannot keep up with changes and uncertainties in the teaching world

Lastly, the literature stressed the importance of induction, mentoring and general support of beginner teachers It is within this context and backdrop that this study took place

The study included an investigation of the perceptions of principals and HoDs about the skills and knowledge of beginner teachers The study also sought to evaluate efforts by individual schools and by district, regional and provincial education offices

to support and assist new teachers in their work The evaluation was informed by earlier observations (see Knobloch & Whittington 2002) which found that without the necessary support (such as mentorship and induction programmes), many beginner teachers develop burnout symptoms in a short space of time

Research questions

The key research questions aimed at beginner teachers were:

• What are the perceptions of beginner teachers of their skills, knowledge and competencies as beginner teachers?

• What are the perceptions of beginner teachers of their work experience after the first, second and third year of teaching?

• Did beginner teachers’ higher education prepare them adequately for the teaching profession?

The key research questions aimed at principals and school managers were:

• What are the perceptions of principals, deputy principals and subject heads of beginner teachers’ skills, knowledge and competencies?

• What do school managers see as the key challenges facing beginner teachers?

• According to school managers, what should be done to enhance the skills, knowledge and competencies of beginner teachers?

• What should be done to retain beginner teachers within the education system?

Research design

As this study targeted as many beginner teachers as possible, surveys proved to be the most suitable research instrument, hence the study drew extensively from survey research A questionnaire was developed and administered However, given the focus

on beginner teachers’ skills, knowledge and competencies, the survey instrument had to be augmented with a qualitative component, as responses about these issues needed to be probed and elaborated on The study therefore combined both qualitative and quantitative research methods

‘useful feedback’ to a variety of audiences, including sponsors, donors, client groups, administrators, staff and other relevant constituencies Most often, feedback

is perceived as ‘useful’ if it aids in decision-making Exploratory research is a type

of research conducted because a problem has not been clearly defined, or because

it allows researchers to gain a greater understanding of something that they do not know enough about The results of exploratory research are not usually useful for decision-making by themselves, but they can provide significant insight into a given situation

The instruments addressed the following:

To draw the sample, provincial-level PERSAL and Education Management Information Systems (EMIS) data showing appointment gains were used Since appointments include beginner and experienced educators, these data were censored to exclude experienced educators The PERSAL and EMIS data also indicated which schools appointed the largest number of new educators The data provided an initial measure of the population size, the institutions beginner teachers graduated from, and information on the race, gender, age and educational achievements of beginner teachers Whereas four provinces had initially been selected, more in-depth analysis

of the PERSAL and EMIS databases necessitated the inclusion of a fifth province, the Free State, to supplement the low number of schools in the Western Cape employing beginner teachers

In selecting schools and teachers, these steps were followed:

• A list of schools with educators who began their teaching careers in 2003, 2004 and 2005 was requested from the provincial education departments

• Only personnel who were permanently employed and appointed between

1 January 2003 and 31 December 2005 were considered for inclusion

• In order to reduce the possibility of older, more experienced teachers being included in the survey, the sample was further limited to teachers who were born on or after 1 January 1980 In cases where this did not produce enough schools and teachers, the birth date of teachers was extended to those born on

or after 1 January 1976

The verification of school and eligible beginner teacher details was essential This led to the exclusion of a number of potential respondents who were found to be ineligible For instance, teachers who had not gone into teaching immediately after graduating from college or university were excluded, even though they could have been in their first three years of teaching at the time of the study The series of challenges encountered affected the sampling strategy, and the final list of schools was ultimately obtained by default

Schools

The selection of the schools was based on the presence of permanently employed beginner teachers (a minimum of two in each school) The intention was to apply a stratified random sampling technique to EMIS and PERSAL data where necessary – stratified by primary and secondary, urban and rural, and previous (pre-1994) education department

In four provinces (Free State, Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal and Mpumalanga), 75 schools were chosen from each province, while in the Western Cape, 40 schools were chosen, making a total of 340 schools The selection of schools was informed by data from the national DoE Eight hundred questionnaires were sent to the selected 340 schools in the five provinces Schools were also requested to indicate whether they were located in suburban areas, townships, rural areas or on farms Five hundred and thirty completed questionnaires were returned The majority of schools (41 per cent) were located in urban areas such as suburbs, 28 per cent in townships, while 31 per cent were located in rural areas (see Figure 2.1)

The profile, in terms of the location of schools by province, differs Most schools in KwaZulu-Natal and Mpumalanga were in rural areas, in the Free State most schools were in townships, while in Gauteng and the Western Cape most schools were in suburbs

South African society is characterised by migration to the cities, which results in more people staying in these places – hence the high percentage of suburban and township schools in the sample Schools in urban areas are also able to raise funds and create more teaching positions than those in rural areas To a certain extent, this illustrates the inequalities in the resource base of schools in relation to geographic location Schools in urban areas experience an increase in enrolment due to migration of families from rural to urban areas, hence the greater demand for beginner teachers in these urban schools

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Figure 2.1 Location of sampled schools

The aim of the sampling methodology was to maintain a 50/50 balance between primary and secondary schools The appointment of new teachers, however, depends

on the availability of posts at a school, irrespective of whether the school is a primary

or a secondary school, or a rural or an urban school Fifty per cent of all the schools sampled were secondary schools, while primary and combined schools made up the rest (see Table 2.1)

Table 2.1 Sampled schools by phase

Note: * Combined school includes both primary and secondary phases.

The sampled schools were linked to EMIS databases to provide information on the employment of beginner teachers at schools, according to former education department Prior to 1994 South Africa had 18 education departments distributed throughout the provinces For the purpose of this report, these former education departments were standardised by categorising them according to the population group they serviced before 1994, that is, African, coloured, Indian or white (see Table 2.2)

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Free State Gauteng KwaZulu-Natal Mpumalanga Western Cape Total

21 32 47

8

74

41 38

21 56

17 27

13

61

26

31 41

28

Rural Suburb Township 100

90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 Percentage

Table 2.2 Sampled schools by former education department

Former education department

%

Mpumalanga

%

Western Cape

The intention of the research was to reach as many beginner teachers as possible and, once again where possible, to maintain a 50/50 split in terms of gender Table 2.3 gives a picture of the respondents by province and gender, and indicates that women constitute the highest proportion (69.5 per cent) of beginner teachers in the sampled schools; men make up 30.5 per cent This corresponds to EMIS and PERSAL data which show that approximately 71 per cent of post level 1 teachers are women and 29 per cent are men On the other hand, in terms of the gender distribution

Table 2.3 Beginner teachers by province and gender

In terms of gender (see Figure 2.2), 57.4 per cent of African beginner teachers are female and 42.6 per cent are male, giving a difference of 14.8 per cent – a very small difference compared to the other racial groups White beginner teachers show

an immense difference in the proportion of female to male teachers, reflecting the overall proportion of male to female white teachers in the profession Females make

up 83.3 per cent of all white beginner teachers, and males only 16.7 per cent Indian beginner teachers show the same trend as white beginner teachers, with females making up 85.2 per cent and males 14.8 per cent Coloured beginner teachers also have a considerable difference in percentage points between female (68.8 per cent) and male (31.2 per cent) teachers, but not as wide as that shown in the gender breakdown of white and Indian beginner teachers

Figure 2.2 Beginner teachers by race and gender

More than half (51.4 per cent) of beginner teachers in the sample are permanently employed, 45.4 per cent are temporarily employed, 1.3 per cent are substitute teachers and 1.9 per cent did not respond According to some of the temporary teachers interviewed, many are employed by the DoE at overcrowded schools as a temporary measure to relieve the heavy workload of staff at a particular school They are employed on a contractual basis, the period determined by the school, with the option of renewing the contract

Beginner teachers provided information on their highest qualification obtained The information was disaggregated as follows:

31.3 68.8

100

90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0

• 31 per cent have matric plus three years’ educator training (e.g PTD);

• 31.4 per cent have matric plus four or five years’ educator training (e.g BEd, BPed);

• 3.4 per cent have a bachelor’s degree with no educator training (BA, BSc, BCom);

School managers

For the survey, a two-stage random cluster sample of 600 school management personnel was drawn and stratified in terms of urban–rural schools, private–public distinctions, and socio-economic profiles of the areas in which the schools are located

Initial analysis of the survey data assisted in identifying participants for face-to-face interviews in four provinces (the Western Cape, Gauteng, Mpumalanga and KwaZulu-Natal) Five schools were visited for the interviews in Mpumalanga, in three regions/

districts – Mhlanga/Ekangala, Nelspruit and Steelpoort In Gauteng, two schools were visited in Pretoria North and two in Ekurhuleni East In the Western Cape, two schools were visited in Kuilsriver and two in Khayelitsha Four schools were visited

in KwaZulu-Natal In each school, one HoD from those who had completed the questionnaire was interviewed

Data collection methods

Written surveys

To access as many beginner teachers as possible, the written survey was chosen as the preferred initial research instrument Eight hundred written questionnaires were sent to 340 schools in the five provinces The schools included both primary and secondary schools Five hundred and thirty completed questionnaires were returned,

a response rate of 62 per cent The questionnaire was developed according to the themes listed earlier

Face-to-face interviews

As noted, analysis of survey data assisted in identifying respondents for face-to-face interviews The objective of the interviews was to verify the responses of the survey and therefore formed part of the triangulation mechanism to see if there was any discrepancy between the two data sets (Did research participants agree with the overall findings of the survey or not?)

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with teachers and school managers

This study notes the particular strength of the interview, confirming Olesen’s (1994)

When developing the interview instrument, a number of factors were considered and helped to phrase the questions For example, one of the issues that came out strongly was the overall positive rating of the beginner teachers’ knowledge and the quality of their teaching The interviews conducted with a number of HoDs served

as elaboration and confirmation of survey data, and thus followed the same themes identified in the analysis of the survey data Examples of themes pursued in the interview schedule were: the key challenges faced by beginner teachers; support structures and mechanisms; and the adequacy of beginner teachers’ professional training and their knowledge of their respective learning areas

In Mpumalanga, five schools were visited – three primary and two secondary The schools were located in townships and suburbs in the Bronkhorstspruit, Witbank and Nelspruit areas The interviews were conducted primarily with HoDs and beginner teachers

In KwaZulu-Natal, two primary and two secondary schools were visited over a period

of two days An analysis of the PERSAL data shows that the majority of beginner teachers prefer teaching in urban areas, hence the location of the selected schools

in township and suburban areas Interviews were conducted with deputy principals, HoDs and beginner teachers, and in two cases, with principals

Four schools (two primary and two secondary) were visited in the Western Cape

in the following areas: Parow, Grabouw, Khayelitsha and Macassar In three of the schools, interviews were conducted with principals and in one case, with the facilitator for teacher training Six beginner teachers were interviewed, but in one school, due to unforeseen circumstances, it was not possible to interview beginner teachers

In Gauteng, two schools were visited in Pretoria North and two in Ekurhuleni East

Data presentation and analysis

This section presents the data obtained through the surveys and the interviews – the data from the two research instruments are not treated separately However, data from beginner teachers and data from school managers are initially presented and analysed separately, and then discussed together later

Data from beginner teachers

This section looks at beginner teachers’ education and training, specifically classroom activities and pedagogical competencies

Classroom activities

Teachers were asked about the pre-service training they had received in classroom activities, which were divided into student teaching; methods and materials you were taught; how to structure teaching and learning activities; discipline and classroom management strategies; education theory; assessment theories and practices; and interpersonal and public relations/skills

The ‘classroom activities’ section investigated the extent to which the teacher training curriculum programmes supported trainee teachers’ teaching These curriculum programmes or themes were rated by teachers according to a four-point scale with the following parameters: ‘A lot’, ‘Moderately’, ‘Somewhat’ and ‘Not at all’

Most beginner teachers (63 per cent) considered ‘Student teaching’, the practical component of the education course, to be the most beneficial programme preparing them for the teaching profession This could be because they gained first-hand experience of the school environment through interacting with learners, teachers and school management in a real school setting

A large proportion (48 per cent) of beginner teachers also considered the programmes ‘Methods and materials you were taught’ and ‘How to structure teaching and learning activities’ to be beneficial in their teaching practice

Teacher training programmes which received the lowest positive ratings from beginner teachers were ‘Education theory’, ‘Assessment theories and practice’ and

‘Interpersonal and public relations/skills’ More than 20 per cent of beginner teachers did not perceive these three programmes to have any impact at all on teaching practice

The implication of this information is that a large proportion of beginner teachers regard the practical component of their teacher education programme as the most beneficial Beginner teachers felt that emphasis should be placed on methods, materials and how to structure teaching and learning activities Not many beginner teachers put much faith in the theoretical component of the teacher education programme, specifically ‘Education theory’ and ‘Assessment theories and practice’

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The data pertaining to classroom activities curriculum programmes were further analysed to disaggregate the responses by gender, to see to what extent the responses differ between males and females Male beginner teachers had higher and more positive responses than female beginner teachers regarding their pre-service teacher training In all the categories, the proportion of responses of male teachers was highest in the column ‘A lot’, indicating a positive response to pre-service teacher training Although the data are not analysed by gender, there seems

to be a strong tendency among male teachers to be more positive than their female counterparts

Female beginner teachers ranked ‘Education theory’ higher than male beginner teachers – it was the fourth highest curriculum element selected by female beginner teachers, and the sixth highest for males ‘Discipline and classroom management strategies’ was regarded by many males as the second most important curriculum element to impact positively on their teaching, while female beginner teachers ranked

it lower, as their fifth most important curriculum element

Pedagogical competencies

The different styles or approaches to teaching are often referred to as the teacher’s pedagogy When deciding what teaching method to use, a teacher will need to consider learners’ background knowledge, the environment, their learning goals, as well as the standardised curriculum as determined by their school district

Beginner teachers indicated how they perceived their own pedagogical competencies

by completing a range of statements Judging from the percentage responses to each statement, beginner teachers were very confident about their pedagogical competence

in the classroom

When combining the categories ‘Strongly agree’ and ‘Agree’, more than 90 per cent

of beginner teachers were extremely confident that they were more than adequate

in lesson preparation, content knowledge, making key concepts explicit to learners, relating content knowledge to everyday experiences, helping learners to engage with texts, and creating a stimulating classroom environment They also all felt that they were competent in classroom management

Interest in knowledge or skill areas

Teachers also had to indicate knowledge or skill areas that they have an interest in pursuing Respondents could only select one option from a given list The majority considered ‘Counselling’ (36 per cent) as the most important area for further training, followed by ‘Classroom management and discipline’ (26 per cent), ‘Methods and materials in subject area’ (15 per cent), ‘Teaching methods’ (9 per cent) and

‘Education theory’ (5 per cent)

One of the main reasons why ‘Classroom management and discipline’ and

‘Counselling’ were emphasised was clarified during the interview sessions Beginner teachers felt that with the abolition of corporal punishment, they had not received training in alternative methods to deal with undisciplined learners They had also

and ‘Classroom management and discipline’ as a first option, while the preference for ‘Counselling’ alone was more pronounced in primary schools A significant proportion of teachers in secondary schools selected ‘Method and material in subject area’ as a third option, after ‘Counselling’ and ‘Classroom management and discipline’, while only a small proportion in primary schools selected this as an option

Discussion of data from beginner teachers

The responses of beginner teachers to questions dealing with conceptual knowledge, their grasp of their subject and concepts, and preparation and presentation of lessons were mainly positive Most affirmed that they planned and prepared their lessons adequately, demonstrated adequate subject knowledge, were able to make key concepts explicit to learners, helped learners to engage with and interpret the subject matter, and that they were competent in classroom management

If the above data were to be accepted as an accurate reflection of the quality of the new cadre of beginner teachers in the profession, then it would suggest that institutions involved in the pre-service training of teachers have developed teacher education curricula that produce young teachers of high quality

However, accepting beginner teachers’ conceptual knowledge to be adequate to impressive would be in stark contrast to findings of several recent studies that deal with South African teacher quality Vinjevold and Taylor (1999), for instance, argued that the main problems in South African schools were teachers’ low levels

of conceptual knowledge, their poor grasp of their subject, and the range of errors made in the content and concepts presented in their lessons The Ministerial Committee on Teacher Education (DoE 2005b) echoed these findings Jansen (2004) also found that most teachers (especially in high schools) are under-prepared to teach the subject matter accurately and clearly

Why then is there such a major difference between the findings of recent research studies and the responses from beginner teachers? Assuming that the often cited work

of Vinjevold and Taylor (1999), among others, is authoritative, then there are two possible conclusions The first could be that the self-reported assuredness reflected in the responses of beginner teachers who participated in this study is questionable In this case, the argument could be that despite their claims, recently qualified teachers are in reality not particularly well qualified or prepared to practise in schools This would inevitably lead to a situation where the mediocrity of new teaching recruits merely reproduces the general ethos of mediocrity in the teaching corps that is claimed to exist by Vinjevold and Taylor (1999)

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A second possible explanation for the contradiction between the teachers’ reported confidence and competence and the weakness of beginner teachers reported by researchers could be that something happens to the largely good-quality graduates who come out of our teacher education institutions – their experience in schools as full-time teachers, without nurturing or support, may eventually leach away their motivation and expertise

self-The discussion which follows interrogates only the possibility that the high level of self-reported competence of beginning teachers is not necessarily reflective of the reality Later, the teachers’ self-reported competence will be analysed against the data collected from their school managers on the same issue, as well as against findings from the three studies already mentioned (DoE 2005b; Jansen 2004; Vinjevold & Taylor 1999)

The selections and comments teachers made in the survey were subjective Teachers would have ascribed, consciously or not, underlying assumptions and consequences

to each chosen answer and comment This means that there is a likelihood that some respondents, anxious to present the ‘right picture’, felt pressure to exaggerate their own capabilities It is possible that some young teachers deliberately inflated their own ratings because of the fear that school principals might study their completed questionnaires, despite the commitment of the HSRC to confidentiality in terms of a code of research ethics In cases where beginner teachers may have exaggerated their competence, the triangulation of sources (teachers, school managers and literature/other research findings) therefore helps to reduce the unreliability of the data

There are several other explanations for the high ratings beginner teachers give themselves It is well documented that the first few years of teaching are extremely difficult for most teachers and present them with a range of experiences that are threatening to their sense of self For many beginner teachers, to admit fallibility may not be an option and so, as they struggle to sustain their sense of personal competence, self-reported competence and confidence may serve as a coping mechanism According to Samuel (2005), teacher identity within the early stages

of a career is often uncertain and directed towards survival rather than towards developing teaching professionalism as an independently identified goal Perhaps most beginner teachers really do think they are doing well in terms of their perception of a potentially threatening environment

Alternatively, it can be argued that beginner teachers are under such pressure to survive in their first two years that they have no space to engage in sustained levels

of self-reflection, and that this is something that can be developed later

One principal, asked in an interview whether a teacher who is a relative newcomer

to the field can be reliably assessed, argued as follows:

I would say it is very difficult to have a rating of a teacher within the first two years A teacher might have excellent communicative skills; a teacher

on the other hand might have wonderful grounding and knowledge about the subject matter But all the other aspects and issues that the person has

to deal with will make him a good teacher If he fails to pitch up for an after school training session, is he still a good teacher? If he stays absent the first quarter for four to five days, is he still a good teacher? You should