Education Studies 5:

EDES 412
38

STUDENT NAME: Mthobisi

SURNAME: Zwane

STUDENT NUMBER: 220031241

ASSIGNMENT TOPIC: Teacher’

INTRODUCTION

Teaching is a complex profession that’s requires a lot of time and dedication, it plays a big role in a
learners academic and personal development. This is what makes it very important and deserve to
be appreciated. As important as it is, educating is very challenging and requires continuous
reflection, evaluation, and improvement. Teaching is also in a process of evolution time and time
again. My research aims to investigate Teachers understanding of teaching by examining their
perceptions, attitude, experience about teaching different context. As a result, understanding
teachers perceptions beliefs about teaching is essential to improving their professional
development, classroom practices and learners outcomes.

Paradigm

In educational research, the term paradigm refers to a researcher's 'worldview', stated Kivunja (as
sited in Mackenzie 2006, p26) This worldview is the point of view, style of thinking, school of
thought, or set of shared beliefs that informs the interpretation or meaning of study findings. Every
teacher has their own view some teachers believe that in order of effective learning and teaching
their classes need to be teacher-centered and other believe that learner-centered classes are more
effective during teaching and learning, these are some of the patterns that teachers follow or believe
in.

The Interpretivist paradigm's main goal is to comprehend the subjective realm of human

experience, Kivunja (as sited in Guba & Lincoln, 1989, p29). Every effort is made to comprehend
the viewpoint of the topic being viewed rather than the observer's point of view.

Design style

Case study research comprises an in-depth assessment of a specific event, setting, organization, or
social unit. A case study frequently has a defined space and time frame: "some kind of
phenomenon in a bounded context." (Miles, Huberman, and Saldana 2014, p. 28). A case study is
an in-depth investigation of a current event in its real-world setting.

Data generation method (non-participant observation)

In my research I will be doing a non-participant observation where in would be observing my

Step 2 – She gave me her lesson plan; the goals and objectives of this lesson were very clear. The
lesson was based on how Division and Multiplication go hand in hand, reverse psychology.

Step 3 – Her introduction was both teacher and learner centered as she has them a 5 mental maths
questions and asked learners to say the multiples of 5, after that she asked learners to divide all the
answers, they got with 5 to see if they also get the same 3 digits that were used from the first place.

Step 4 – When she got into the development of the lesson, she involved learners by constantly
asking them to give out answers for her examples as she was doing them on the board, I can say
that this was learner centered as she constantly involves them when she is teaching.

Step 5 – After the teacher had taught her lesson, she gave learners classwork to work with.

How the study will be done

This study on teachers' understanding of teaching is a qualitative study that involves non-
participant observation. I will observe my teacher mentor at my school while he/she is teaching the
topic Learning from Leaders in Grade 4 Social Science class. In this study, I will use the
interpretive paradigm. I will make notes as I observe. After observing the teacher, I will read
through my observation notes several times to better understand the data. I will then code the data
and extract themes from the data.

Rational

Since I started as a mathematics student teacher two years ago, I have observed that the subject
learners are lacking when it comes solving mathematical problems on their own whereas when the
content is being taught and the examples are being done in class they tend to be copying and
understanding very well. I made the decision to research the potential causes of this discrepancy
between teaching maths and answering mathematics question among the mathematics enthusiasts.
The following are the findings that I got after a throughout observation:

 Examples limit the thinking activity of a learner rather than showing a challenging example
so that learners would be able to deal with challenging questions.
 While explaining the steps educators needs to average their pace for everyone in class to
follow all the steps with understanding as maths involves multiple steps to follow in order
to find an answer.
  Shortage of textbooks and other study materials in school also has an influence in learners not

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visualizing what they are being taught, they only see it on the board.

Purpose of the study

The purpose of this study is to gain a knowledge of a teacher's understanding of teaching. The
qualitative method seeks to comprehend the personal realm of human experience. As a result,
interpretivists embrace a theory of relativity in which a single phenomenon can have various
interpretations as opposed to a fact discovered by a method of measurement. Almost often,
adopting an interpretive approach viewpoint helps researchers understand things better. Consider
the phenomena and its diversity in the context of its specific circumstance rather than seeking to
generalize the basis of understanding for the entire population, stated (Grønmo, S. 2019, p6) . I will
use a case study methodology design because we will be observing one class and the teacher and
learners that will be the case of specific people where we look for in-depth description for that
particular case, how the teacher will be teaching, how the learners are reacting, are they learning,
the learners body language as well as the teacher, learners interaction, and so on. Data will be
acquired by naturalistic observation since I will just be viewing the natural context, non-participant
observation in which I will observe participants without actively participating, and I will observe
the entire class without interacting with them or anything. My target audience consists of the
students and their instructor, Mrs. S. P Mdhlolo. The Primary School of Bahlebonke
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Definition of Terms

Teacher-centered - Teacher has the ultimate authority and is in charge of learning for that reason
students do not have adequate opportunities to develop their critical thinking and problem-solving
skills, Garrett (as cited in Willower 1975. p35).

Learner-centered – Learners make sense of what they learn in a classroom environment in which
they are stimulated to develop their reflective and critical thinking, Garrett (as cited in Willower
1975. p35).

Endeavour – to put in a lot of effort on something you want to achieve.

Phenomenon - is something that is observed to occur or to exist. (Van de Ven, A. H. 2016, p266)

Data generation method - refers to creating or producing new data. (M., Ghorbel. 2023. P332).

Qualitative study - An enquiry process of understanding based on distinct methodological traditions

Discrepancy - an unreasonable or surprising lack of compatibility or similarity between two or

Enthusiasts – some with a strong passion, energy, and excitement for the things you do and the
experiences you have, whether it's in your personal or professional life. (Brinks, V. 2016. P1163)

SUMMARY 8

In this chapter the goal was to introduce my non-participant observation research that I have been
doing. The concept of paradigm was introduced and briefly explained alongside the interpretative
paradigm as well. After that the design style that would be used in this investigation was briefly
explained as well as the data generation method which is non-participant observation. The way that
this observation is going to be conducted was highlighted. I then moved on to the rational of this
study before closing on the purpose of the study and the definition of new terms. In chapter 2, I will
be discussing some key factor that you should look at when conducting such observation as the one
that I am conducting. In chapter 3 I will be reporting on the findings that I have obtained during
this observation putting the factors that I discussed on chapter 2 into practice, looking at each and
every detail on the teacher while they are teaching in class.
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