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- Title
High School Physical Sciences Teachers' Competence in Some Basic Cognitive Skills.
- Authors
Selvaratnam, Mailoo
- Abstract
The successful implementation of the national high school Physical Sciences curriculum in South Africa, which places strong emphasis on critical thinking and reasoning abilities of students, would need teachers who are competent in cognitive skills and strategies. The main objectives of this study were to test South African high school Physical Sciences teachers' competence in the cognitive skills and strategies needed for studying Physical Sciences effectively and also to identify possible reasons for their difficulties and suggest methods for overcoming them. The study method used was the analysis of teachers' answers to questions that were carefully designed to test competence in explanation skills, mathematical skills, graphical skills, three-dimensional visualization skills, information-processing skills and reasoning skills. Seventy-three teachers from about 50 Dinaledi schools in the North West and Kwazulu-Natal provinces were tested. Teachers' competence was found to be poor in most of the skills tested. About 40 % (average performance in all 14 test questions) of them had difficulty in answering the questions. Teachers' lack of competence in cognitive skills and strategies would be an important limiting factor in the successful implementation of the Physical Sciences curriculum. An urgent need therefore exists for training teachers to increase their competence in the cognitive skills and strategies that are needed for studying science effectively.
- Subjects
SOUTH Africa; PHYSICAL sciences education; TEACHER training; HIGH school teachers; COGNITIVE ability
- Publication
South African Journal of Chemistry, 2011, Vol 64, p231
- ISSN
0379-4350
- Publication type
Article