Challenges facing school teachers and principals in managing and implementing the revised curriculum in Ompundja circuit in Namibia
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Date
2022
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Publisher
University of Namibia
Abstract
Namibia is at the stage of reviewing the curriculum structure of its basic education. Resultant, the Ministry of Basic Education, Arts and Culture has introduced a revised curriculum since 2015, whose implementation needs a carefully designed approach for its effective adoption. The study explored the experiences of teachers and principals of public schools on challenges with management and implementation of the revised curriculum in Ompundja Circuit and suggests how the challenges can be addressed. A model is designed to address challenges that hinder successful management and implementation. Using Social Realism and Instructional Leadership theories, the study addresses the two main research questions: What are the challenges experienced in the management and implementation of the newly revised basic education curriculum in Ompundja Circuit in Namibia? It further addresses two sub-questions as follows: What challenges do teachers and principals of public schools in Ompundja Circuit experience with the management and implementation of the newly revised curriculum? How can these challenges be addressed to ensure successful management and implementation of the revised curriculum? The second research question is which model could be developed to enhance successful management and implementation of the revised basic education curriculum in Ompundja Circuit? Furthermore, the study addressed two main objectives: To establish challenges experienced in the management and implementation of the newly revised basic education curriculum in Ompundja Circuit in Namibia. The first main objective is sub-divided into two sub-objectives: To identify challenges experienced by public school teachers and principals in Ompundja Circuit with the management and implementation of the newly revised basic education curriculum. In addition, to determine how the challenges experienced by public school teachers and principals could be addressed to ensure successful management and implementation of the revised curriculum. The second objective is to develop a model that can be used to enhance successful management and implementation of the revised basic education curriculum in Ompundja Circuit. Explanatory Sequential Mixed Methods design and multi-stage sampling were used to select the respondents and participants from a population of 409 teachers including 27 principals in the Ompundja Circuit in Namibia. A stratified random sampling was used to select three schools each from a stratum of primary, combined and secondary schools. Again, as simple random sampling was used to select 120 respondents from the selected schools. In the second round of data-generating, a purposive sampling technique was used to select five principals. A sample of 120 respondents (29%) completed a questionnaire while five principals were purposively sampled for a face-to-face interview. Quantitative data were analysed using the Statistical Product and Social Sciences and qualitative data were analysed using the content analysis method.
This study revealed that training on curriculum implementation was offered, however, the training needs to be enhanced. Some schools were well furnished with infrastructures; nevertheless, others need workshops for vocational subjects as well as science and computer laboratories. It was found that there were challenges related to teaching and learning resources, which could be addressed by engaging stakeholders. Further, there were funding challenges, which could be addressed through stakeholder funding, re-introduction of school development funds and increase of universal primary education funding. There was a shortage of vocational subject teachers, which could be addressed through training. There was a low teacher-learner ratio in rural schools and a high teacher-learner ratio in urban schools. To address overcrowding, combined schools in urban settlements should be promoted to senior secondary schools as well as providing more classrooms and teachers. There was a need to fund learner support initiatives. Another challenge is that the new curriculum was designed in a top-down manner; therefore, to address the negative attitudes teachers and principals should be involved in curriculum development. This study recommended that stakeholders should support schools with educational resources. Schools should enhance in-service training on revised curriculum implementation. Furthermore, expertise-sharing and integration of the curriculum content in teacher training programmes were recommended. Further research about establishing the level of implementers’ participation in the planning and design of the RCBE and assessing the structural, cultural and agential constraints on the use of ICT tools in providing quality teaching and learning were recommended. Lastly, the study was concluded with a model design for addressing challenges relating to revised curriculum implementation.
Description
A dissertation submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of
Doctor of Philosophy in Education (Educational Management & Administrative)
Keywords
Curriculum implementation, Ompundja circuit, Experiences of teachers and principals of public schools