Opportunities and Challenges for Teacher Education Curriculum in South Africa

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Driven by centralised state processes, externally mandated and regulated, the restructuring of teacher education curriculum and institutions in South Africa has radically changed the teacher education landscape. How universities mediate, contest and resist the resulting pressures has differed, according to their historical legacy, their specific trajectories of restructuring, and their leadership dynamics. This monograph traces the micro-level responses of teacher educators at five universities experiencing the impact of the restructuring processes with varying degrees of intensity, and selected as representative of the system as a whole. The analysis reveals distinct patterns of recurriculation, ranging from bureaucratic compliance to creating academic coherence between contrasting legacies. What becomes clear is the need for teacher education academics to grasp the challenges and opportunities to assert their power over shaping curriculum processes that will produce competent, confident teachers. Opportunities and Challenges for Teacher Education Curriculum in South Africa forms part of the Teacher Education in South Africa series. The series documents a wide-ranging set of research projects on teacher education conducted by the Education, Science and Skills Development research programme within the Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC), as part of a consortium of research partners. A comprehensive investigation of the dynamics shaping the professional development of educators, the series provides important reading for educationists, academics and policy-makers.

CHAPTER 1 Introduction
Glenda Kruss

CHAPTER 2 The challenges of curriculum restructuring in context: 19942007
Glenda Kruss

CHAPTER 3 A distant reality: Aligning curriculum at North West University
Ursula Hoadley

CHAPTER 4 Initial teacher education at Unisa: a closer look at distance education
Chaya Herman and Venitha Pillay

CHAPTER 5 Contestation and accountability: the IPET curriculum at the University of Zululand
Crispin Hemson

CHAPTER 6 Cutting and pasting: The fabric of teacher educators’ work at CPUT
Adele Gordon

CHAPTER 7 (Re) configuring the (con)text: IPET at the Wits School of Education
Adele Gordon

CHAPTER 8 Creating new knowledge or bureacratic compliance: comparative patterns of curriculum change
Glenda Kruss

REFERENCES

APPENDIX A. List of interviews
APPENDIX B. INTERVIEW SCHEDULES

Dr Glenda Kruss is a chief research specialist in the Education, Science and Skills Development research programme. She has a DPhil from the University of Ulster in Northern Ireland.