Browsing by Author "Schafer, Marc"

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    Crtitical reflective teaching practice: enhancing teachers' consciousness of their teaching
    (University of Namibia, 2013) Luwango, Luiya; Schafer, Marc
    This paper emphasises the aspects that teachers should critically focus on when reflecting on their teaching practices. The paper emerged from a case study that was conducted in three secondary schools in Rundu- northern Namibia. Critical reflective teaching involves thought and action, and it raises teachers' consciousness pertaining to what they do. Through critical reflective practice, teachers scrutinize their beliefs and knowledge of the subject and their practice, through purposeful thoughtfulness. The selection of the three participants was based on their rich practical professional knowledge and exemplary teaching practices as evidenced. Interviews focused on 'when, what, how and why these selected teachers reflected critically on their practice. Data collection and analysis were done through an interpretive approach. Interviews and document analyses were the two research tools used for data collection and triangulation. Interpretations of the findings were validated through member checking where participants verified the interpretations made of their interview respectively.
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    A needs analysis for the implementation of a complementary course in Mathematics education for teachers of Mathematics in Namibia: a case study of the BETD graduates
    (University of Namibia, 2013) Ilukena, Alex M.; Schafer, Marc
    After the introduction of the Basic Education Teacher Diploma (BETD) in Namibia, a number of studies were conducted on how teachers, lecturers, stakeholders and the Namibian public perceived the BETD program and its implementation. However, very few studies focused specifically on mathematics subject content knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge in the BETD. This paper reports on a study which investigated the need for a complementary course for mathematics teachers to address the perceived lack of mathematical content and pedagogical knowledge in the Namibian BETD. The study involved five mathematics school teachers, two former mathematics college lecturers in the Kavango educational region and a professor of mathematics education at the University of Namibia. These participants were purposefully selected because of their knowledge and experiences with various aspects of the BETD program. And the data was collected by means of two methods namely documents analysis and semi-structured interviews. These methods complemented each other and also provided a degree of cross checking of claims.