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- Title
The knot of curriculum and teacher professionalism in post-apartheid South Africa.
- Authors
Msibi, Thabo; Mchunu, Sihle
- Abstract
This paper is a response to the recent curriculum revisions in South Africa, namely the introduction of the Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement (CAPS). We argue, using the deliberationist perspective to curriculum development, that the attention on curriculum policy is misdirected and fails to sufficiently address one of the key problems facing schooling in South Africa today: that of the lack of teacher professionalism. We review both scholarly and popular literature to demonstrate the challenges of the education system as largely rooted in the historical apartheid construction of teachers, which positioned white teachers as professional while casting African teachers as mere technicians. We hold that current revisions to the curriculum seem to suggest that government has given up on the professional agenda of the post 1994 dispensation and seem to be making the curriculum ‘teacher proof’, thus making teachers more powerless and unimportant. We suggest that the focus should not solely be on the curriculum, but also on creating professional teachers. This means empowering teachers, addressing SACE, separating the role of teacher unions from government and attracting the best students for the teaching profession.
- Subjects
SOUTH Africa; PROFESSIONALISM; TEACHERS; POST-apartheid era; CURRICULUM planning; EDUCATION
- Publication
Education as Change, 2013, Vol 17, Issue 1, p19
- ISSN
1682-3206
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1080/16823206.2013.773924