Prof MM van Wyk between all the participants who attended his workshop

As part of the capacity building endeavours in the College of Education, the Department of Graduate Studies have identified 22 colleagues who need support with academic writing skills for publications. Prof MM van Wyk, from Curriculum and Instructional Studies, initiated an academic support series. He plans to present five workshops to address various topics such as abstract writing, literature reviews, research methodologies and critical reading skills to analyse journal articles. The aim is to empower the colleagues to produce and publish one article in an accredited journal for 2013. On 30 April he presented a workshop about literature review and theoretical frameworks to seventeen of these colleagues.

Break away session with Prof Sonja Schoeman, Dr Geesje van den Berg, Dr M Maphalala, Dr Mbunyuza de Heer Menlah and Dr Vusi Nkonyane

The Department of Curriculum and Instructional Studies attended a strategic planning session in March at Leriba Lodge in Centurion. The purpose of the Strategic Planning Facilitation sessions was to provide a framework that will facilitate the development of an implementation plan that will unfold over the next 18 to 24 months. The plan will serve to guide the Department of Curriculum and Instructional Studies to provide differentiated and innovative study programs to its students.

Prof Louis van Niekerk. Prof Gerda Ferreira, Dr Elize du Plessis and Dr Matseliso Mokhele

An outside consulting company, ConsultaClientX was invited to facilitate the strategic planning. ConsultaClientX followed an integrated approach with the development of the strategic framework by combining different aspects of strategy development into a unique strategic development framework. The facilitators focused on the “Y factor” to identify the strategic drivers for the department and its reason for existence. The department formulated a new vision and mission as the old vision was long and not easy to own. The new vision was created as a team effort through the participation of all the academic staff members in the department.

The colleagues unpacked the products and services of the departments, the M&D focus areas and identified niche areas and flagship projects. Ultimately, the final agreed upon formulation for the question – “WHY does the Department of Curriculum and Instructional Studies do what it does?” – led to the mission statement that the department is working towards a tomorrow that is better than today.

Our new vision is: “Toward excellence in teacher education tuition, research and community engagement”

CEDU, Curriculum and Institutional Studies Department staff that attended the summit

Curriculum development professionals, lecturers, researchers, institutional designers, learning developers, education planners, policy makers and educational specialists gathered from the 24 -25 April 2013 at The Core, in Sunninghill, Johannesburg for the “The Curriculum Development Innovation and Reform Summit 2013”. They came to discuss what is happening in this field of specialization currently as well as what the emerging trends are in Curriculum Planning and Development in Africa and Internationally.  Curriculum Design, Diversity and Innovation, Quality Assurance and Curriculum Development; and Curriculum Innovation were their themes and perspectives which were used to address the issue of creating an Afrocentric Curriculum through Innovation, Strategies and Literacy.

“Designing the 21st century classroom and addressing the Learning Challenge” was the platform which allowed delegates to explore tools needed to successfully embed digital content into the curriculum. Also exploring how social media could be incorporated into the curriculum while recognising that there is an absence of the teacher’s voice in planning the curriculum. The reform processes taking place within the curriculum arena poses a challenge and this was highlighted during a debate and discussion. Leading experts who advised on latest strategies, challenges and developments pertaining to Curriculum Development, Innovation and Reform strategies, included Dr Azwi Tshivase, from Directorate of Curriculum and Learning Development, Unisa. He presented a paper entitled “Transforming teaching and learning in ODL environments in Africa in the context of curriculum development reform”. Curriculum development is a much debated concept where change is concerned. “The conference was a platform to unfold curriculum challenges and developments within the education sector” says Dr. G van den Berg, COD – Curriculum and Instructional Studies.

Prof Anna Hugo wished Prof William Fraser welcome at Unisa

Prof Anna Hugo on 11 April 2013 introduced Prof William Fraser from the Department of Science, Mathematics and Technology, Education at the University of Pretoria to the audience. He was invited by the Department of Language Education, Arts and Culture to come and present a guest lecture on how to avoid the common pitfalls in the business of doing academic research. During his presentation, he informed academics that they have to wear many hats when they do their work, which ranges from being teachers, supervisors, researchers toeing scientists. He finds that with the current emphasis on research, the teaching aspect of their work is unfortunately much reduced in standing.

In order to be a sought after supervisor, Prof Fraser says you need to have developed a research focus area of expertise during the course of your career. Academics need to consider where they wish to be in ten years from now to help them focus their energy. By means of a slide he pointed out eleven different categories in which an academic can be active. They can choose to focus on being a senior professor, or a director of their own research centre, the coordinator of their own international masters or doctoral programme, an A ‘B’ or ‘C’ NRF rated scientist, a leader in their field, a consulting editor to journals, the editor of their own journal, a sought after supervisor, a sound methodologist, an established and highly cited author, or to be a nationally and internationally renowned scientist. If an academic has a specific clear focus area in their work, it becomes much easier to streamline the various activities that they are engaged in.

Prof PM Sebate listens to Prof William Fraser who was speaking about the pitfalls to avoid as an academic

His advice for establishing a professorial identity is that academics should associate with at least one research journal and enrol with that journal. They should stay within the broad focus of their department and decide early on what their specialisation field will be. It is important to be specific and establish a record of NRF or related research funding and teach and supervise within that field of specialisation and research methodology only. It helps to set-up national and international networks and links and to utilise sabbaticals well. Take care to have professors extraordinary appointed, and research and publish with them. An academic should voice their opinion at seminars and conferences and strive to publish in quality international journals. “Join professional bodies and organisations (societies; institutions and academies) and don’t underestimate the value of your contribution to collaborative research reports” said Prof Fraser. It also is of great importance to find a local and international mentor and for an academic to take care of their allocated students. It will also be helpful to master a local and a classical language and to support the department’s scientific field(s) of specialisation. Last but not least, an academic must avoid becoming academically arrogant.When building their departmental research programme an academic should do the following:

• Align your field of specialisation with that of the department
• Nurture the Centre of Excellence (CoE) concept
• Run your postgraduate programmes from the CoE
• Teach at undergraduate level
• Attract international students and
• Publish

With regards to student foci Prof Fraser shared his strategy on how he supervises his students across the four years that they enrol with him to acquire their degree. In the first year he focuses them on research support, proposal defence and ethics clearance. In the second year he expects his students to write three chapters and to do their field work. In the third year their focus is on data analysis and synthesis of their findings. The final year consists of writing up the rest of the chapters and for submission of the final document.

Dr TV Manyike thanked Prof William Fraser for his excellent presentation

Years of experience have also taught Prof Fraser that different approaches to students are needed as different personalities require different ways of supervision. Some students are highly creative, unstructured, and will be changing the goalpost all the time. If not guided correctly these students will never finish as they never reach consensus and are forever changing their frameworks. They need to be guided and provided with structure. Others are ‘No-where goers’, they are those who are always waiting to be told what to do and then there are those who are highly structured executives always working with rules and frameworks and they need to be given their freedom. Over the years he has developed his own approach to supervision. His student’s topic and focus should vest within his own personal field of specialisation. He avoids working qualitatively and has preference towards quantitative methodologies and he informs his students accordingly. It is very helpful to set up an e-mail file to communicate general information to all the students and he provides his students with a solid reading list which is linked to a very sound theoretical framework. As the supervisor he decides on their framework and he tells them how it will impact on their assessment of the thesis/dissertation. He briefs them from the start on the technicalities they need to comply with (referencing, ‘anatomy of an argument’, etc) on the report.

Prof Fraser’s teaching philosophy leads him to expect his students to call on him when they need him and he insists that they call him at least once a week! He gives them a hard time during the first year of study and he also guards against being in a position where he ends up writing up their report. It is helpful to avoid too short turnaround times for the students as they achieve too little quality when this is so. A supervisor should use tools such as ‘track changes’, create e-mail files and archive all correspondence between him and his student. He never does any language editing, but focuses on being a researcher and not just a supervisor.

Prof Fraser says that because he has developed his own master’s or doctoral programme which is focused on his field of specialisation, he can recruit local and international students into his programme. Experience has taught him to build complexity into simplicity and he expects his students to complete three chapters within their first year of study. The choice of examiners is very important – make sure that their voices (as experts) are substantiated in the student’s work. As a supervisor you need to make sure that students do not rewrite all literature and theory on the subject. When you register a research project it is important to draw all your students onto that project. A research proposal should be limited to ten pages maximum.Major threats that need to be managed by the supervisor are the unsympathetic administrative, governance systems and examiners. Research needs to be substantiated with enough data and it is wise to guard against poor justification, substantiation and silent voices. Supervisors need to avoid short listing examiners they are not acquainted with, should keep a visual record of the progress of all their students on i.e. a big poster which keeps track of each person’s progress. It also is important to stop the process and redo the fieldwork should this become necessary and don’t be tempted to patch.

The presentation was very well attended and sparked numerous questions which Prof Fraser eloquently answered. The session was found very helpful by those who attended, also from other departments in CEDU and from within Unisa. More such in-depth presentations are planned and the staff in the Department of Language Education, Arts and Culture, look forward to the next one.

Dr Connie Haasbroek

Dr Connie Haasbroek shared her knowledge on“The importance of sleep, especially when studying” on MyUnisa radio during an interview in the Lunch Box time slot on Tuesday, 23 April. Nancy K was die presenter/producer of this radio insert.

Dr Haasbroek first used the Oxford dictionary definition which describes sleep to set the scene. It defines it as a recurring condition of the body and mind in which the nervous system is inactive, the eyes are closed, the postural muscles relaxed and consciousness is practically suspended. Sleep plays an important role in the development and functioning of the brain, it is needed for our brains to mature, to stay emotionally sound and to be in top performance physically.Very important hormones are released while people are sleeping such as the growth hormone in children. Research studies indicate that sleep loss may cause obesity because chemicals and hormones that play a key role in controlling appetite and weight gain are released during sleep. Some scientists believe that as we dream to fix experiences in our long term memory; others believe we dream about things worth forgetting to unclog our brains.

A person’s body clock works over a period of 24 hours.  When it is dark, the darkness hormone, melatonin, is released around about 22:00.  The release is caused by the drop in daylight and temperature. The daylight that emerges with the break of a new day prevents the further secretion of the darkness hormone that causes sleep.The body clock wakes us up when it releases a stress hormone called adrenocorticotropin.  Chemicals can influence the natural neural switch in the brain e.g. sleeping tablets, stimulants (caffeine, bull with wings). This may influence our natural sleep-wake cycle and the quantity and quality of the sleep we needed.

Sleep has a recurring cycle of 90-110 minutes which repeats itself. Each of these cycles is divided into two categories; namely Non Rapid Eye Movement (NREM) that has four stages and Rapid Eye Movement (REM).
NREM:

• Stage 1: Light sleep – when a person is still half wake, half asleep and/or easily awake (10 minutes).
• Stage 2: True sleep (20 minutes) – Largest part of sleep. Breathing and heart rates slow down and urine secretion is slowed down.
• Stage 3: Deep sleep – Brain produce delta waves (High amplitude and low frequency = slow brain waves). This is when breathing and heart rate are at their lowest. Urine secretion is almost stopped.This is when blood flow is directed away from the brain, towards the muscles for restoring physical energy.
• Stage 4: Deep sleep – Rhythmic breathing takes place and there is limited muscle activity. If awakened, we are disorientated. This is the time when bed wetting, sleep walking and nightmares may happen.

REM:
People move into this stage after we fall asleep. It happens 3-5 times per night and for duration of 70-90 minutes. During this stage we are actively dreaming. Breathing and heart rates, as well as blood pressure are up, our bodies are paralysed which is nature’s way of acting out our dreams.  After the REM stage the whole process starts all overall again.

In answer to the question “How much sleep is needed? She said animals and people are different in how much sleep we need as certain snakes need 18 hours, cats sleep for 12 hours, sheep for 4 hours and giraffes only sleep for 2 hours. Elephants sleep standing up during NREM, but lie down during REM sleep. Humans need between 5-11 hours; 8 hours are the average for adults, 10 hours is the average for teenagers. Records for the longest periods without sleep are between 11 and 19 days. After a few days, the individuals participating in these studies start to hallucinate, experience delusions e.g. paranoia, have blurred vision, slurred speech, as well as memory and concentration lapses.

If we do not sleep people start to function badly as the brain cannot function. Sleep is service time for our body and mind. Without sleep you will not be able to work, learn, create, and communicate.  Neglecting to sleep will result in major mental and physical breakdown. With continued lack of sleep the brain will shut down and serious affect your language, memory, planning and sense of time.  A person will not be able to respond to changing situations and will not be able to make rational judgements in real life situations.  The decrease in performance is equivalent to a blood alcohol-level of 0.05%.

Human bodies and minds prefer routine.  Healthy sleep routines will include discipline with regard to the time, routine and place.  It is wise to stay away from stimulants such as caffeine, artificial light and excitement e.g. DVDs/videos, games, before going to bed. Dr Haasbroek asked the listeners: “Do you have energy to play games/watch DVDs until early hours of the morning, but cannot get up in the mornings?” If so this can partly be ascribed to artificial light, light from computers, televisions and cell phones that inhibit the secretion of the darkness hormone, melatonin. So the technology we love, works against us if we are overexposed.

You are not getting enough sleep if you experience one or more of the following:

• Need an alarm clock to wake up
• Make use of the snooze button
• Are glued to the bed
• Feel sluggish in the afternoon
• Need to nap during the day
• Get sleepy/drowsy during the day or when studying
• You feel tired, depressed and moody most of the time
• Have impaired motor skills which leads to increased risk of accidents

So if a student does not allow time for enough sleep they run a risk of the following problems starting to occur:

• They will not be able to give attention/concentrate on their studies
• They will forget and will not be able to remember what they have learnt
• They will not be able to make sound judgements and/or use creative skills and problem solving skills during assignments and/or writing exams
• They will not be able to keep their girl/boyfriend happy; they will be grumpy and irritable most of the time
• They will get sick; their immune system will become less effective and they will experience colds, flu and other infections
• They will not be able to cope with every-day living stress, and especially exam stress
• And lastly, take note; a person can start to gain weight!

With enough sleep during study and exam time, students will be able to start and complete their day with a smile. They will be full of energy and fully alert – firing on all cylinders. They will be motivated and looking forward to the day that they put their gown on AND their dreams of successful completion of their studies will come true! And now it is time for me to wish you all good night, sleep tight and don’t let the bed bug bite or carry you away!

Ms Luxie(GK)Mokwena

Gladys Kedibone Mokwena, popularly known as ‘Luxie’, joined Unisa as a lecturer in January 2013 in the Department of ABET and Youth Development. Her research interests lie in the ABET curriculum, in adult literacy, educator and learner support, in women empowerment and income generating projects. Her involvements in adult literacy campaigns included Ithuteng, Unisa-SANLI and Kha Ri Gude. She says she knows the hardships of poverty and has committed herself to serving the marginalised in our communities with passion and commitment. For her pastoral role she cares for and supports people living with HIV and AIDS and has initiated food gardens and beadwork training projects to encourage learners to support themselves. She strongly believes that by providing skills training through an integrated education and training approach, ABET can make an invaluable contribution to the personal, social and economic development of individuals and our society.

Ms Mokwena’s experiences as a teacher date back as far as 1977. She trained as a primary and high school teacher holding a BA, H Ed and B Ed(general) at Unisa, so she also is an Alumni of Unisa. In 1995 she decided to switch to Adult Basic Education and Training (ABET), the education and training program for adults and youth with little or no formal qualifications. She knew she was venturing into new territory and she found the experience unnerving to say the least. To be better prepared for her new duties, she did another Bachelor of Education (B Ed) focused on the area of adult education and also completed a Master of Education (M Ed), these were both obtained at the University of the Witwatersrand. Prior to assuming a lecturing post at Unisa, she worked for the Department of Education as the ABET Senior Education Specialist and was appointed as an examiner in Travel and Tourism learning area of the ABET qualification as endorsed by the Department of Higher Education and Training.

Ms Lineo Johnson joined the Adult Basic Education & Training (ABET) and Youth Development in January 2013 as a lecturer. She holds a B Ed, Hons and M Ed in Adult Education from Wits. Before joining Unisa, she was studying for her doctoral degree and was also engaged as a Research Assistant with the School of Social Sciences, as well as tutoring in Sociology at Wits. She worked as an adult education practitioner for past 30 years mostly in Lesotho, where she completed her undergraduate degree in Adult Education with the National University of Lesotho (NUL) and also worked as a lecturer there.

Ms Lineo Johnson

She has also worked with various research consultancy agencies, community-funded projects and international NGOs – European Union, Irish Aid, CARE-International and Lesotho Highlands Water Project. Her areas of expertise are teaching and learning, community development, research and sociology of adult education. Ms Johnson says she is too old for a specific hobby but she loves life and is in good health. So far she is enjoying her work and studies at Unisa.

Dr BA Segoe

Dr Bobo Segoe of the Department of Curriculum and Instructional Studies was awarded his doctoral degree on 22 April 2013. His thesis, Learner support in the provision of teaching programmes for under-qualified teachers acknowledges that, although there are different kinds of learner support structures in distance education, registration support, learner support services, contact lessons, technological support and feedback strategies are very critical.

Supported by empirical data, this study seeks to argue that instructional designers and tutors in distance education spheres, need to ensure that quality learning support as learning environments should be designed according to the principles of resource-based and independent learning.“ In sustainable learning environment, support must be designed according to the principles that ensure that distance education learners progress from teacher-directed activity to self-regulated activity”. It is hoped that this piece of work will help to promote more discussions and debates about the use of learner support services in distance education institutions throughout the globe.

Prof Veronica McKay speaking about the successes and challenges of CEDU in context

The College of Education (CEDU) has been in existence for just over a year now. In a meeting called with the Staff of CEDUin the Senate Hall on 7 May 2013, the Principal and Vice Chancellor of Unisa, Prof MS Makhanya, said the successes are being noticed. The meeting began with a word of welcome by Prof Veronica McKay who began with a presentation entitled“The successes and challenges of CEDU in context”. Her presentation began with a reference to some of the systemic needs for teacher development as identified in the “Integrated Strategic Planning Framework for Teacher Education and Development”by the Departments of Higher and Basic Education. She mentioned that the College of Education would need to work towards,in particular, strengthening foundation phase teaching including Grade R, teachers with specialisations in Mathematics and Science, the African languages and English as a second language amongst others.

She referred to the 2013 enrolment statistics of the College stating that a large proportion of the CEDU’s students are from Kwa-Zulu Natal and Gauteng and the majority of CEDU’s students are 20 – 29 years old. She also pointed out that Data from the SACMEQ tests (and a range of other local and international assessments) show that teachers require more training in the content of their subjects. In this context it is evident that the University needs to take cognisance of that reality and needs to provide opportunities to bridge the gap for teachers who wish to improve their skills. The Programme Qualification Mix (PQM) renewal process within the College of Education is linked to this endeavour.

Prof McKay also shared that many development initiatives are taking place within the College of Education. Twenty two staff members are being groomed for their NRF rating applications and 37 staff members are participating in the Brown Bag Series to assist them with Doctoral degrees. An ODL research group has been established and various regional workshops have been presented to give guidance to the Master’s and Doctoral students enrolled in the college.  However she pointed out that college is struggling with a shortage of supervisors.

She referred to the 27-funded community engagement projects as being “engaged research” projects that will impact on schools and communities and which will also feed into curricular formulation and result in a number of publications. In particular, she mentioned the Teacher Centre project funded by the Department of Higher Education aimed to give CEDU and other practicing teachers access to ICT facilities and communities of practice. The college is implementing this project with the DBE and will be functioning in 45 of the DBE’s 112 teachers’ centres in Africa which gives the university access to 65 teacher centres now accessible to CEDU. These centres will enable CEDU to assist and engage with our students. While large numbers of staff were involved in funded community engagement projects she pointed out that staff needed to take advantage of the external grants available for research.

Prof MS Makhanya, Principal & Vice Chancellor of Unisa addresses the colleagues at the College of Education

In his address to CEDU, Prof MS Makhanya said there are no shortcuts and that Unisa students need to meet the requirements before they can graduate hence there is a need to pay attention to issues of quality. He also stressed that the university have committed to a digital future as the number of students applying with the university have increased which leaves the university no other option but to do things differently. Appropriate investments are being made by the university to build the infrastructure of the university so that they are able to deliver optimally but that quality relied on everyone in the university to work harder and smarter to be able to give the students the kind of teaching that they require. It cannot be achieved by only a few hardworking people. As a university we are creating our own future.  We need to justify our funding from government. We can only be funded to the level of what we are delivering.  He pointed out that the College needs to impart the values of teaching and learning both through what we teach and by how we teach. We have to create teachers who are able to help and teach our young children.

Our students need a system which provides clear guidance as to what they need to study to become a certain kind of teacher, be that mathematics, science or geography teachers. A simplified PQM will assist CEDU with this.  With regard to research, Prof Makhanya pointed out that NRF ratings will also be rewarded with more privileges for NRF rated researchers as it confirms the academic’s scholarship. The university aims to attract NRF Chairs and this is linked directly to our areas of excellence.  He commended the new on-line placement for students needing to do teaching practice and stressed that this “work integrated practice” should also lead to teachers coming out of their training who are well equipped to excel in the classroom.

Prof RM Phakeng, Vice Principal: Academic & Research shares her thoughts on the potential residing within the CEDU staff

In her turn Prof MC Maré, Vice-Principal: Academic & Research stressed that high throughput must be matched by high quality. She outlined the importance of the new PQM serving the graduateness of teachers so that the College is able to supply the system with teachers of high quality.  Prof RM Phakeng, Vice-Principal: Research & Innovation also complimented the College on the achievements of the staff and emphasised the potential which CEDU has. She referred to the pockets of excellence and the “young bright sparks” who are emerging as talented researchers. The university will continue to grow and nurture the staff and it is only a matter of time and then the results will begin to show.

CEDU staff members listen attentively

Professor Kesh Mohangi

Professor Kesh Mohangi started as an associate Professor at the Department of Psychology of Education on 1 January 2013. She is an Educational Psychologist who is registered with the HPCSA and has previously worked at the Department of Educational Psychology at the University of Pretoria. Currently she is involved in teaching and learning related to the following programmes:
- Undergraduate module: ETH102L- The Learning Child
- BEd (Hon) (School Guidance & Counselling)
- MEd (Guidance & Counselling)
- Masters & Doctorate Research Supervision
Her research interests are in child and adolescent psychology, in childhood HIV and AIDS and caregiver support, and in the field of Educational Psychology: Assessment and Intervention. Her expertise lies within qualitative research methodology in particular, participatory research methods with children.

Dr Lynn Preston

Dr Lynn Preston joined the Department of Educational Psychology on 1 February 2013. She is working with the B Ed Hons and M Ed guidance and counselling students. She was working in her own private practise before with trauma as her area of specialisation. She enjoys helping people to cope better after a stressful event. She is the proud mum of her two children, Jessica Lynn (22) and Malcolm (26)