In post-apartheid South Africa, 11 languages, including English and indigenous languages, were given equal status as official languages. Yet, more than 25 years after democracy, Black parents still believe that their children's wealth and success depend on English, and therefore, send them to English-medium schools where they take English as a…

The phenomenon of teenage motherhood is a major concern worldwide. The teenage mothers endure many challenges that could affect their academic goals and successes if there is insufficient support. However, some teenage mothers manage to develop certain forms of flexibility to manage these adversities. This study explored the teenage mothers'…

Inclusion and diversity are the important factors to consider in teaching contexts which aim to provide quality and relevant education to all learners. Teachers need to ensure that they design learning experiences that are responsive to learners' individual differences and learning styles. This is particularly true in the multigrade context, where…

In the study reported on here, we investigated the effects of the use of dynamic geometry software (DGS) (i.e., GeoGebra) on learners' learning and a teacher's beliefs. The learners and teacher involved in the study were from a high-poverty, rural high school in South Africa. We compared grade 11 learners (N = 56) who used GeoGebra in the context…

The use of social networking technologies (SNTs) for academic purposes has created new pedagogy opportunities, especially for well-resourced teaching and learning institutions. This article reports on a study that analysed the use of SNTs for postgraduate research supervision at a South African university classified as previously disadvantaged…

Multilingualism in education is encouraged in South Africa, and children are expected to become bilingual and biliterate during the early primary grades. Much focus has been placed on measuring literacy in children's first language, often the medium of instruction (MOI), and English, the language typically used as MOI from fourth grade. However,…

This study used the community of inquiry (CoI) framework and the affordances of Internet of things (IoT) to explore how the faculty of education of a rural campus of a university transitioned from face-to-face to online modes of instruction. In this qualitative interpretive study, data were collected through open-ended questionnaires from four…

The teaching of second language that is also a language of teaching and learning of other subjects, has to be meticulous. Considerate attention is utmost where this teaching occurs in under-resourced learning environments where learners encounter the second language for the first time. In instances where the teaching was inadequate, as in the…

This paper explores students', preservice teachers' and inservice teachers' perceptions of the contributions and challenges of using participatory visual methodologies (PVM) to enhance HIV education in rural schools. Drawing on findings from three research projects conducted in KwaZulu Natal, South Africa, four positive contributions are…

As we enter the last ten years leading to the realisation of the Sustainable Development Goals in 2030, African countries are still plagued with poverty and underdevelopment. For most children in Africa, the attainment of Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 4 will remain elusive. Drawing from two interrelated empirical studies, one focusing on…

Challenges in the educational arena are not new phenomena. However, with the recent outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, researchers and educators have been made even more aware of the need for a paradigm shift in education. Blended learning, as opposed to fully online learning or traditional face-to-face teaching, has been well-researched and has…

Public education is not just a way to organise and fund education. It is also the expression of a particular ideal about education and of a particular way to conceive of the relationship between education and society. The ideal of public education sees education as an important dimension of the common good and as an important institution in…

The purpose of this research was to explore how two rural primary teachers used technology to enhance their pedagogical and content knowledge of Geography in their everyday teaching and learning. Hence the theory of Koehler and Mishra's Technological, Pedagogical and Content Knowledge (TPACK) framed this research. Although the Intermediate Phase…

This article reports on the influence of communication skills on rural students' resilience and well-being. Purposive sampling was used to retrospectively select 40 (f: n = 20; m: n = 20) Grade 9 students in a rural school that were involved in a larger youth project that aimed to deliver pathways towards resilience in rural schools through…

Grade 1 learners in South Africa are not receiving the quality education they deserve. Early Childhood Education forms the basis of all education; however, numerous challenges in the South African education system impede the teaching and learning of young children. In this article we investigate Grade 1 teachers' responsibilities in the class and…