Critical Emancipatory Research Research Articles

The Digitalisation of Elitism and Sifting? Observations on the Online Registration of First-Year University Students in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa

This paper argues that the digitalisation of university registration processes has given rise to concealed elitism. The phenomenon became apparent during the COVID-19 pandemic, as elite students accessed advanced medical care and education degrees while individuals from indigent families and rural communities bore the brunt of the pandemic. Drawing from the perspectives of critical emancipatory research (CER), the observational study described in this paper sought to explain students' experiences during the transition to digitalised registration processes and to identify practical solutions for the deficiencies in the new system, ensuring inclusivity for all students in the future. This observational study did not have a specific sample size but observed the groups of incoming first-year students gathered outside many university gates during the registration period in the province of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. The study consequently concluded that many universities in KwaZulu-Natal are not prepared for digitalisation of student applications for several reasons: (i) the use of technology conceals elitism, a lingering aspect of the apartheid era that disenfranchises students from indigent and rural communities; (ii) universities lack reliable infrastructure, as they were not initially designed for contemporary communication and teaching methods; and (iii) the rise of technological innovation destabilises the intentions of our South African democracy and the massification agenda. This paper proposes a dual method of communication (virtual and walk-in inquiries) that would accommodate democracy and recognise people's right to education. This approach would ensure that students from different socio-economic backgrounds are accommodated in higher education institutions. The paper recommends technological innovations that do not remind black and poor students that they were once marginalised from accessing tertiary education due to systems that were not favourable to them.

Human Rights Education: Exploring the Safety of Teachers in South African Secondary Public Schools

This paper examined the extent and nature of safety for teachers in their different school settings and further underscored the importance of safety for teachers in the school context. The current school environment is violent owing to the increasing lack of teachers’ ability to maintain order in schools due to the uncertain alternatives to corporal punishment. This creates a hostile learning environment that weakens the teachers’ position of power and prohibits them from using their authority and fulfilling their duty to provide learners with compassionate monitoring. A qualitative interpretivist research paradigm was used in this study employing Critical Emancipatory Research (CER) as a research framework. A CER framework aims to strengthen the liberating, enlightening, emancipating, and empowering democratic values of equality and justice among the researcher and the participants in the research setting. A team of four teachers, a principal, and the School Governing Body (SGB) member from each school were purposively sampled to apply the principles of PAR in Lejweleputswa District in the Free State Province in South Africa. A focused group was employed to answer the following questions: What are the perceptions of secondary school teachers regarding their safety in the school setting? To what extent does learners’ violent behaviour threaten teachers’ safety at schools? And, how can teachers be assisted to change their minds regarding Human Rights Education as a tool for peaceful education? Data was analysed thematically. The findings of this research showed that teachers do not feel safe at their workplace, they fear both learners and parents who most of the time come to humiliate them physically and emotionally in front of their learners. The study contributes to a debate on the safety of teachers in schools for professional development. Keywords: Human Rights Education, Teacher-Learner Relationships, Teachers’ Safety, Parental Involvement.

THE UNDERSTANDING OF LEARNER INTEGRATION IN A SELECTED EX-MODEL C SCHOOL

Learner integration has become an asset for the meaningful resettlement of learners from different backgrounds in a one learning environment. Psychologically, the learner integration phenomenon is a crucial component in a teaching and learning context because it is linked to psycho-socio elements for the learners’ well-being. This study aimed to explore the understanding of learner integration in an Ex-Model C school. This paper identified the central elements of the diverse perceptions constituting successful learner integration in an Ex-Model C school. Moreover, the key traits in the understanding of learner integration were presented about the three overall themes that emerged from the findings of the study. The study was conceptualised within the Critical Emancipatory Research (CER) theoretical framework. The participants and research site were selected using purposive and convenience sampling. Data were generated through photovoice and multi-stakeholder meetings. Based on the South African historical background, this study maintains that learner integration has a transformative agenda as the phenomenon leans towards the democracy, social justice, and emancipation of education practices that are negatively affected by the inherent issues from the previous education system in South Africa. This implies that effective learner integration plays an essential part in ensuring equity, equality, and democracy in South African schools specifically Ex-Model C schools.

An intervention strategy to enhance technical vocational education and training entrepreneurship education lecturers’ knowledge of content and teaching

The aim of this paper is to design an intervention strategy to enhance Technical Vocational Education and Training (TVET) entrepreneurship education (EE) lecturers’ knowledge of content and teaching. The objective of the study involved unpacking the literature regarding Pedagogical Content Knowledge or knowledge of content and teaching (KCT). The study adopted a critical emancipatory research (CER) paradigm, in which the criteria for quality were determined by advancing an agenda for equity, social justice, freedom, peace, and hope. A participatory action research (PAR) approach was chosen as an appropriate methodology because it provides for collaborative research, in which all participants contribute to the design of the framework. Regarding this study, it thus necessitated teamwork involving the teaching of entrepreneurship, which consisted of the lecturers, a parent representative, a head of department, two students, and a local entrepreneur. The data was generated and collected by means of discussions/formal meetings with team members. The data was analysed using van Djik critical discourse analysis (CDA). The findings reveal that Technical Vocational Education and Training college lecturers possessed poor knowledge of content and teaching. Therefore, there is a need for proactive intervention to improve the teaching of entrepreneurship.

PGCE students’ learning through reflective journaling during teaching practice: An exploratory study

In the study reported on here the reflective journals of student teachers enrolled for the Postgraduate Certificate in Education (PGCE) were explored to determine what new learning they had acquired during their teaching practice. Reflection is a process of reviewing an experience of practice to analyse it for improvement. In this way, reflective journals could be viewed as a tool that moulds and harnesses the professional development of student teachers. Critical emancipatory research was adopted to reflect on student teachers’ journaling as an important assessment tool to be used to empower students with pedagogical content to convey knowledge to learners. In the study we purposively sampled a selected group of 10 PGCE students’ reflective journals. We found that students’ reflective journals are important tools that shape student teachers’ professional identities during teaching practice. Furthermore, we found that student teachers’ journaling is an emancipatory platform that allows students teachers to think independently and innovatively to free their thoughts on real teaching and learning situations. We recommend that teacher training institutions should emphasise the importance of journaling in teacher training programmes with a focus on critical thinking and problem-solving innovation.

Exploring safety in disaster-induced displacement relocation site schools in Tokwe-Mukosi, Zimbabwe.

The victims of the Tokwe-Mukosi disaster-induced displacements in Zimbabwe were relocated to Chingwizi, Chisase and Masangula. This qualitative article explores the safety of learners in Tokwe-Mukosi disaster-induced displacement schools. The safety of learners in schools influences the education’s agenda. Most of the studies on the safety of learners focus on rural and urban schools at the expense of schools located in disaster-induced displacement sites. This article seeks to explore learners’ safety in disaster-induced displacement schools in Zimbabwe. The 2013 Zimbabwe Constitution and the Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education Act 1987 (Section 25:04) emphasise the importance of learners and teachers’ safety. The critical emancipatory research (CER) was used as a theoretical framework in this article. The participants responded to the research question: Are school authorities ensuring safety in disaster-induced displacement relocation site schools, Tokwe Mukosi? Data were generated through photovoice. Participatory action research was used as a research methodology with 15 participants being purposively selected. This article found that learners were not safe in the schools located in disaster-induced displacement areas in Tokwe-Mukosi. To mitigate safety problems, participants recommended that the government and other stakeholders should collectively build a safe learning environment.

Psychological Experiences and Vulnerability of Lesbians, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender (LGBTI) in Access to Quality Health Care Services in Rural Areas of Zimbabwe

LGBT is an acronym for lesbians, gay, bisexual and transgender individuals who are characterised by sexual behaviour, identity, and desire. These individuals are most discriminated and stigmatised as a result of legal, cultural and religious landscape. LGBT are a hidden or invisible population with disproportional risks to health infections. The LGBT are placed outside prime laws of the land hence they are vulnerable to abuse, rejection and face some hindrances in accessing quality health care, education, and other social services. Accessing needed health care services is among the most daunting challenges that LGBT community confronts especially in the rural settings. Religiosity and cultural values, acts as a bigger impediment to access health care of people who practice ‘same gender loving’ in Sanyati rural areas of Zimbabwe. The LGBT experience sexual act through intercrural sex, fellatio, hand-jobs, foot-jobs, inter-gluteal sex, mammary sex, oral and axillary sex. The study used the Transformative Paradigm (TP) and Critical Emancipatory Research (CER) as the beacon of the research. This research design enables the researcher to explore the problems faced by LGBT population in accessing the much-needed health care services and their vulnerability. Data was gathered from the lesbians, gays, transgender and bisexual on their experience and vulnerability in accessing health care services in rural areas. Data was collected through social medial platforms and face to face through a snowball sampling and opportunistic sampling technique. The research findings revealed that LGBT face challenges of accessing the needed health care services due to fear of coming out, discriminatory and incompetent healthcare, lack of information, underrepresentation and lack of confidence. The study recommends opening up referral clinics in rural areas and offer education on the effects of not seeking health care services. The study also predicts that HIV/AIDS will not end so early due since the key population are left out as a result of legal and cultural issues.

Critical Emancipatory Research Approach to Enhance Performance Among Progressed Learners in Life Sciences

In this theoretical paper, we discuss critical emancipatory research (CER) as an approach to enhance performance among progressed learners in life sciences. Most of the progressed learners perform poorly in life science igniting the need to find alternatives to enhance the performance. We have earthed this paper in CER based on the values such emancipation, transformation and social justice which are pertinent to reinvent better performance in life science. To collect data, we used participatory action research ad used thematic approach to make meaning of the data. The finding of the paper is that progressed learners face various vulnerabilities, which impede their performance, necessitated a need to rethink approached used for teaching and learning. The main argument of the article is that CER has the impetus to change the progressed learners’ attitude, enhances effective communication and collaboration between the progressed learners, parents, teachers and the DBE to improve the academic performance of progressed learners in life sciences. Received: 2 May 2021 / Accepted: 15 June 2021 / Published: 8 July 2021

Covid-19 and the entrenchment of a virtual Elite private school: Rethinking education policies in Zimbabwe

By using a critical emancipatory research framework, this theoretical paper discusses the COVID-19-induced commercialisation of the education system in Zimbabwe. It argues that COVID-19 exposed and widened the digital gap between privileged and underprivileged learners, regardless of the learners’ geographical location. The digitalisation of the education space –in adherence to World Health Organization’s COVID-19 guidelines – has resulted in the creation of virtual elite schools. Learners from privileged families found sanctuary in digital learning, whilst underprivileged learners continue to be exposed to the reality of commercialised education. This trend has revealed educational inequalities between privileged and underprivileged learners. The paper answers two major questions: 1. What are the inequalities that were reintroduced by the COVID-19 pandemic in the Zimbabwean education system? and 2. How effective is stakeholders’ response to COVID-19-induced inequalities? The paper argues that COVID-19 has dashed the hopes of free education for all, by creating a digital gap that perpetuates and entrenches inequalities in relation to learners. In light of these findings, the study suggests that education stakeholders invest in digital infrastructure, with special attention being paid to learners’ economic status, as opposed to their geographical location.

“Don’t Delay Learning”: Igniting Promotion of Pedagogical Transformation Strategies in Early Childhood Care Education

The global pandemic COVID-19 has forced traditional teaching pedagogies to meet the new educational demands such as remote learning. The safety measures and regulations of COVID-19, such as social distancing, have challenged all facets of education to transform their pedagogical strategies to mitigate the spread of the pandemic, but the rate has been slow to catch up the lost learning time in Early Childhood Care Education (ECCE). This study, underpinned in critical emancipatory research, responded to two questions: what are the challenges of ECCE in the context of COVID-19 and how ECCE could adapt ways of promoting transformative pedagogical strategies. This article underpins the notion that ECCE practitioners should be equipped with novel technology methodologies that replace traditional face-to-face teaching and learning. However, it is reasonable to believe that face-to-face teaching and learning will not be totally replaced by any other new methodology or fads; it will remain important for some years to come, especially in the lower level classes. A hybrid approach of using both the in-person and distance learning strategies for flexibility and manageability by both learners and practitioners seems promising at the moment. In short, this paper explores the challenges to explore promotion of pedagogical transformation strategies in ECCE, and offers some correctives because this will be an ongoing issue for years to come. There are no easy solutions to be packaged in fancy terminology. We argue that the early promotion of transformative pedagogical strategies will assist the children and make the practitioners’ work more flexible and understandable.

Pathways to Mitigate Challenges of Learner Academic Performance in a Grade 10 Economics Class in South Africa

This paper aims to explore the pathways to mitigate challenges of learner academic (LAP) performance in a Grade 10 economics class in South Africa. The challenge of poor LAP has ushered a myriad of predicaments in schools globally. These predicaments include lack of teacher inclusion in decision making, inability to work cooperatively together, and lack of professional development opportunities geared towards LAP. The study was qualitative, with 15 participants chosen through purposeful sampling from one rural school in the Thabo-Mofutsanyane education district. This paper is couched in critical emancipatory research with emphasis on the emancipation of the teachers regarding pathways they can self-develop to mitigate the challenges of LAP. The focus group discussions were used to gather information regarding pathways to mitigate the challenges of LAP in schools. The study revealed that teachers possess a very equivocal and varying experience regarding the pathways to use to mitigate the challenges of LAP. The findings suggest that for successful implementation of pathways to mitigate the challenges of LAP, schools need to invest in training teachers for team-teaching and avail the necessary resources (both human and physical) to ensure effective quality teaching and learning exist in the school. The article recommends that schools should develop policy frameworks, together with relevant stakeholders, to guide novice teachers on the strategies they can use to mitigate the challenges of LAP in their classes.

Critical Emancipatory Research Paradigm: Undoing Hierarchies in the Research Process

Critical Emancipatory Research Paradigm: Undoing Hierarchies in the Research Process

Critical Emancipatory Research Paradigm: Undoing Hierarchies in the Research Process

Critical Emancipatory Research Paradigm: Undoing Hierarchies in the Research Process

WhatsApp Messenger as a Mediating Tool in Times of COVID-19 for Enhancing Student Engagement in e-Tutorials at a Rural South African University

The COVID-19 pandemic has ushered in myriad of predicaments in societies around the world. These predicaments include plummeting economies, access to technological resources, and access to quality teaching and learning in higher education institutions. This paper is couched in critical emancipatory research with emphasis on emancipation of rural students in the new normal that has emerged because of COVID -19 pandemic. Participatory Action Research was used as a research approach to collect data through WhatsApp Messenger where the discussions were centred on two questions which are; what are the experiences of students on the use of WhatsApp by tutors and how can learning using WhatsApp enhance students’ engagement? The findings of this study suggest that students were having difficulties with engaging in online tutorials. These challenges include inadequate access to technological devices, skills and competencies in using technological tools, network connectivity challenges, and low levels of engagement. The paper ends by arguing that there is need for the universities to invest in emancipating tutors, availing digital devices to rural students to enhance teaching and learning as well as reducing city and rural divide in South Africa.

Managing the Psycho-Social Vacuum of COVID-19 among Rural Learners through Ubuntu

The advent of COVID-19 has thrown the world in upheaval, most notably in the operationalisation of secondary schools. Observation, bodies of existing literature, and experience have shown that rural secondary school learners are disillusioned and uncertain on the future of their academic development amidst the “psycho-social” vagueness regarding their schooling and well-being. This study draws its background from South African teachers’ perspectives and proposed Ubuntu as relational framework lensing through Transformative Paradigm to respond to the problem. Critical Emancipatory Research was adopted as a research design. Five secondary schools located in Thabo Mofutsanyane municipality of the Free State, South Africa, form the research site. Two teachers each were selected from the schools using the opportunistic selection approach. A semi-structured interview was used to collect data from the teachers on the challenges faced in managing learners during the pandemic and how to manage the effect of COVID-19 on the learners. Socio-thematic Analysis (StA) was used to analyse the data. The findings showed that learners in rural areas are disadvantaged through the poverty line, affected psycho-socially, and that the need for sociological and psychological supports for teachers and learners becomes expedient in the management of the vacuum created by COVID-19. The study concluded that the principle of Ubuntu during and after COVID19 is a possible means to ameliorate the vacuum.

A critical view of family and religious studies in the context of religious abuse and extremism in Zimbabwe

In this theoretical article, I problematise the nature and structure of family and religious studies (FRS), and its failure to respond to the ever-expanding religious trajectories in Zimbabwe, in particular the religious abuse and religious extremism. Currently, FRS is lacking in some of the aspects needed to ignite a religion-responsive curriculum. The article suggests a need for curriculum reconstruction that addresses the lived realities and challenges students are facing in the 21st century. I ground my argument in critical emancipatory research, one of whose agendas is evoking a democratic, emancipatory and just curriculum that is geared to transforming the social status quo . The article answers two questions: What are the limitations of the present FRS curriculum and the space requiring decolonisation of the curriculum? and How can FRS be enhanced to achieve curriculum relevance and address the lived realities of 21st-century students? The argument of the article is that when curriculum changes are necessary to reflect the multiple perspectives offered by major religions, FRS falls short of addressing the emerging and problematic religious movements that threaten to undermine the beauty of religion in society, as these movements are guilty of criminal practices and abuse of religion. I conclude the article by calling for a curriculum shift, from mere recitation of major religious ideologies to emancipating students by encouraging them to confront and evoke epistemic disobedience in order that they might challenge religious abuse and religious extremism.

Rural online learning in the context of COVID 19 in South Africa: Evoking an inclusive education approach

This paper discusses the challenges faced by rural learners in South Africa in the context of the world pandemic commonly known as COVID-19. Rural learners face unprecedented challenges in adjusting to a new mode of life and learning, the latter being characterised by the predominant use of online, learning management systems and low-tech applications. The paper is informed by critical emancipatory research, I used participatory action research. A total of 10 learners and five teachers participated via Whatsapp. The paper answers two questions: what are the learning challenges faced by rural learners in South Africa, and how can online learning be enhanced in the context of COVID-19? The findings suggest that, while the South African government is promoting online learning as the only alternative in the context of COVID-19, this mode excludes many rural learners from teaching and learning, due to a lack of resources to connect to the internet, the learning management system, and low-tech software. The paper argues that rural learners are critical stakeholders in education and in the fight against COVID-19, and they cannot be left behind in efforts to fight the pandemic.

Towards De-Colonial Agitations in University Classrooms: The Quest for Afrocentric Pedagogy

This study empirically conceptualised and rationalised decoloniality as a way to bridge the vacuumed of Americentric classroom hegemony in an attempt to reposition classroom with Afrocentricism as a dominant practice in Universities. “Ubuntugogy” as a transformational deviation from the Americentric teaching and learning is adopted as a theoretical framework. The study is situated in the transformative paradigm because its focus is to propose “ubuntugogy” as a way to deconstruct Eurocentric hegemony in university classrooms. Critical Emancipatory Research CER as an epistemological movement that is channelled towards emancipation and freedom from ideological enslavement is used as research design, and the participants consist of 10 people, 5 actively experienced lecturers, and 5 students were selected in the QwaQwa campus of the University of the Free State. Free attitude interview was used to collect data from the participant and the data collected were analysed using Thomas and Harden’s three steps of thematic analysis. The study found out that the curriculum and the perpendicular of language and cultural diversities, and colonization of mind and irresistible western classroom system are the significant challenges of implementing “ubuntugogy” in the classroom. The study subsequently proposed curriculum adjustment to accommodate trans-languaging and cultural diversities, and inculcation of self-worth and self-esteem to respond to the western irresistibility in the system with the conclusion that Afrocentric classroom may be one dimensional and thus needs to be redirected to speak to the issues of globalization. https://doi.org/10.26803/ijlter.19.4.2

A socially inclusive teaching strategy for fourth grade English (second) language learners in a South African school

Background: Learners from predominantly less priviledged South African schools encounter English as a language of teaching and learning for the first time in Grade 4. The transition from the use of home language to second language, namely English first additional language, is complexly related to the learners’ inability to read text meaningfully. This complexity is traceable to the reading materials, actual teaching practices and learners’ cultural underpinnings. Learners’ inability to read text meaningfully impacts negatively their academic performance in general.Aim: This article demonstrates how a socially inclusive teaching strategy is used to enhance the teaching of reading in a second additional language to Grade 4 learners.Setting: A one-teacher public school situated on a remote private property with bad access roads. Learners from neighbouring farms walked long distances to school. The teacher’s administrative work and workshops often clashed with teaching and learning that received very limited support.Methods: The principles of the free attitude interview technique and critical discourse analysis were used to generate and analyse the data. Socially inclusive teaching strategy that is participatory action research-oriented and underpinned by critical emancipatory research principles guided the study.Results: The use of socially inclusive teaching strategy helped improve reading of English text significantly.Conclusion: Socially inclusive teaching strategy can help improve learning and teaching support materials, teacher support and learning.

What about the Vapostori now? The ambivalence of politics of relevance among indigenous churches in Zimbabwe

In this theoretical article, I problematise the role of Zimbabwe’s Vapostori movement in the country’s political and religious landscape. I contend that the Vapostori (white-garment churches) has, over the years, been active in attempting to ensure that the former president of Zimbabwe, Robert Mugabe, remained in power, while at the same time casting aspersions on political players of other persuasions and on other churches, and acting as a mobilisation tool of the political party, Zimbabwe African National Union Patriotic Front. In a quest for relevance, the Vapostori promoted the politics of hero worship. In problematising the role of the Vapostori in the political arena, I respond to two questions, namely, what themes or trajectories emanated from the nexus of the Vapostori and the Mugabe era; and how can an indigenous church achieve politics of relevance that are devoid of political capture and hero worship? To respond to these questions, I couch my views in critical emancipatory research, which advocates for social justice, emancipation and improvement of human conditions. The main argument of the article is that the Vapostori, in their quest to achieve a politics of relevance, should avoid centring their narratives around the idolisation of leaders, and hero worship, and instead, champion a theology that values social justice and religious collaboration.