It is expected that that pre-service teachers are adequately equipped to meet the needs of diverse students. This article discusses the choices that teacher educators must make in designing inclusive education courses. The first choice is whether inclusive education will be infused into the curriculum or presented as a stand-alone course. If the…

The article profiles an in-service programme used to introduce a group of 22 high school mathematics teachers to an ethno-mathematical approach. The programme was built on an ongoing district-wide teacher development initiative organized and facilitated by the mathematics district official on a monthly basis. The programme took place over six…

The School of Continuing Teacher Education (SCTE) in South Africa delivers an Advanced Certificate in Education (ACE) Learner Support Programme to Open Distance Learning (ODL) students in Namibia, a developing sub-Saharan African country. This paper examines the experiences of student-teachers using DVDs included in the tutorial package. Fifteen…

The research reported here investigates the efficacy of a module in an Advanced Certificate in Education course in promoting conceptual understanding in Astronomy. The research attempted to find out how teachers' understanding of astronomy concepts and processes change after completing this module as well as the reasons for such changes, if any.…

The kinds of questions teachers ask may thwart or promote learner high-order thinking; teachers themselves must have expertise in questioning skills to promote higher order cognition among learners. Drawing on experiential knowledge of assessment, and as an English-teaching professional development programme (PDP) facilitator, I demonstrate that…

In this article the results of a critical reflection on the analysis of 564 technology education lesson plans are discussed. The critical reflection draws on the responses of approximately 120 South African technology education teachers in a teaching practice workbook where they had to choose a project and base five lessons on the project. The…

This article examines the challenges of teacher development strategies in post-1994 South Africa by arguing that school-based development initiatives address teachers' specific development needs and that it is imperative to understand the conditions under which these initiatives can have a positive impact on teachers. A framework is developed…

Electronic tutors able to respond appropriately to a user's input have been shown to be effective in improving learning in a number of contexts. This study extends this research into the context of conceptual change during in-service science teacher workshops. Quantitative data were collected from 1,049 South African grade 12 physical sciences…

This paper aims to contribute to the emerging literature on capacity-building in statistics education by examining issues pertaining to the readiness of teachers in a developing country to teach basic statistical topics. The paper reflects on challenges and barriers to building statistics capacity at grass-roots level in a developing country,…

We consider the professional development of in-service teachers and review traditional development efforts that have been used in the past. An alternative form of professional development using Japanese lesson study is proposed and discussed as a possibility. A case study involving the Mpumalanga Secondary Science Initiative, where lesson study…

The introduction of the subject Mathematical Literacy (ML) as part of the education reform process, led to the development of many large scale in-service programmes designed to train practising teachers to teach the new subject. The purpose of the study is to examine the challenges associated with providing in-service training for teachers of ML,…

This article uses a South African case study to argue that postcolonial, emerging economy societies in transition often contain schools characterised as high risk and high need. Such schools require teachers to adapt to roles other than facilitating learning, such as psychosocial support and care, and which requires additional professional…

The current post-apartheid system of education in South Africa requires students to be critical thinkers. Education institutions utilise a variety of assessment strategies; peer assessment, self-assessment, and group assessment are some of the formative assessments that are crucial in the promotion of students. This article reports on the findings…

The purpose of this study is to investigate the reading competence of teachers who are enrolled in a distance education programme in a South African university. Many South African teachers upgrade their teaching diplomas by enrolling for a part-time, distance degree at a university. However, many are not prepared for academic study and its focus…

This article provides a case study of the development of the Open Learning Systems Education Trust's "English in Action" program in South Africa from 1993 to the end of 2004. It describes the program's development from a model focused on enhancing learner involvement and learner gains to a model of distance education and open learning…