scholarly journals Learners’ experiences of teachers’ aggression in a secondary school in Gauteng, South Africa

2014 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Aneshree Naicker ◽  
Chris Myburgh ◽  
Marie Poggenpoel
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Secondary School ◽  
School Environment ◽  
Inclusion Criteria ◽  
Need Support ◽  
Negative Effect ◽  
Open Coding ◽  
Field Notes ◽  
Purposive Sample ◽  
General Wellbeing

Background: Research shows that one third of all persons in South Africa have been exposed to one or more types of aggression. It has been observed that learners frequently experience aggression from teachers in the secondary school environment, which has a negative effect on their experience of general wellbeing and mental health.Objectives: The objectives set for this research were to explore and describe learners’ experiences regarding teachers’ aggression toward them and to formulate guidelines for learners and teachers to facilitate their mental health.Method: The population consisted of school learners at a secondary school. Inclusion criteria for sampling were that participants should be grade 11 and 12 learners, between 16 and 18 years of age and should have experienced aggression from teachers in the school. A purposive sample was taken of learners who complied with the inclusion criteria. Data were collected by means of four in-depth phenomenological interviews, 88 naïve sketches, observation and field notes. One central question was posed to the secondary school learners: ‘What are your experiences of teacher aggression toward you in your schooling environment?’ Open coding was used for data analysis. Measures to ensure trustworthiness were applied to ensure the rigour of the research. Ethical principles were adhered to throughout the research process.Results: The secondary school learners were belittled, as well as emotionally and verbally abused. They also experienced fear and anger. Guidelines were derived from these findings for learners and teachers.Conclusion: This research found that learners experience aggression in their school environment and need support to facilitate their mental health.Agtergrond: Navorsing toon dat een derde van alle mense in Suid-Afrika al aan een of ander vorm van geweld blootgestel is. Daar is waargeneem dat leerders dikwels aggressie by onderwysers in die sekondêre skool beleef, wat ’n negatiewe uitwerking op hul algemene welsyn en geestelike gesondheid het.Doelstellings: Die doelstellings vir hierdie navorsing was om leerders se belewing van onderwysers se aggressie te verken en om riglyne te formuleer vir leerders en onderwysers om hulle geestesgesondheid te fasiliteer.Metode: Die populasie het uit leerders by ’n sekondêre skool bestaan. Die kriteria vir insluiting by die steekproef was dat deelnemers in graad 11 of 12 moet wees, tussen 16 en 18 jaar oud, en moes aggressie by onderwysers aan die skool beleef het. ’n Doelgerigte steekproef van leerders wie aan die insluitingskriteria voldoen, is geneem. Data is ingesamel deur middel van vier diepgaande fenomenologiese onderhoude, 88 naïewe sketse, waarneming en veldnotas. Een sentrale vraag is aan die sekondêre skool leerders gestel: ‘Wat is jou belewing van onderwysers se aggressie teenoor jou in jou skoolomgewing?’. Oop kodering is gebruik om die ingesamelde data te analiseer. Maatreëls om vertrouenswaardigheid te verseker is toegepas om die wetenskaplikheid van die navorsing te verseker. Etiese beginsels is dwarsdeur die navorsingsproses toegepas.Resultate: Die sekondêre skool leerders beleef dat hulle verneder word, asook emosioneel en verbaal mishandel word. Hulle beleef ook vrees en woede. Riglyne vir leerders en onderwysers is uit hierdie bevindinge afgelei.Gevolgtrekkings: Hierdie navorsing het bevind dat leerders aggressie in hul skoolomgewing beleef en ondersteuning benodig om hul geestesgesondheid te fasiliteer. 

scholarly journals Learners’ perceptions of learners regarded as having a homosexual orientation in an independent secondary school environment

Curationis ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Hendrik P. Mostert ◽  
Chris Myburgh ◽  
Marie Poggenpoel
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Data Analysis ◽  
Secondary School ◽  
School Environment ◽  
Homosexual Orientation ◽  
Field Notes ◽  
Group Interviews ◽  
Recommended Guidelines ◽  
Physical Bullying ◽  
Democratic Country

In schools today discrimination based on sexual orientation takes place on a regular basis. This form of discrimination leads to aggression towards learners perceived to be homosexual, as well as towards those with a homosexual orientation. For more than 15 years South Africa has been a democratic country with laws that protect learners who have a homosexual orientation. Nevertheless, aggression and discrimination towards these learners still occur in schools. Aggression often leads to verbal and physical bullying of the victims by perpetrators. The objectives of this research were to explore and describe Grade 11 learners’ experiences of aggression towards learners perceived to be homosexual as well as those with a homosexual orientation in an independent secondary school environment. The research design was qualitative, exploratory, descriptive and contextual in nature. The data for this investigation consisted of essays based on a published newspaper photograph, phenomenological group interviews, observations and field notes. Tesch’s method of data analysis was used, and an independent coder assisted. Three themes were identified, discussed and supported by a literature control: that learners experience that it is right and acceptable to have a homosexual orientation; that they experience ambivalence towards homosexual orientation of learners; and experienced feelings that it is wrong to have a homosexual orientation. Recommended guidelines are provided to address aggression towards learners perceived to be homosexual and those with a homosexual orientation.

scholarly journals The experience of aggression by female teachers in the workplace

2015 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
D. S. Van der Merwe ◽  
C. P.H. Myburgh ◽  
M. Poggenpoel
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
School System ◽  
High Stress ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Central Question ◽  
Trauma Research ◽  
Female Teachers ◽  
Negative Effect ◽  
Field Notes ◽  
Purposive Sample

South Africa is a country with exceptionally high levels of frustration and trauma. Research shows that a third of all people in South Africa are exposed to some kind of violence. This causes insecurity and fear, which creates high levels of stress. High stress levels fuels aggression in the workplace. It was observed that female teachers often experience aggression in the workplace. This has a negative effect on their overall sense of well-being as well as their mental health. A purposive sample was selected through two private schools in Gauteng, South Africa, and consisted of eight female teachers. Data was collected by means of in-depth phenomenological interviews, field notes, naive sketches and observation. One central question was posed to the purposefully selected participants: What is your experience of aggression in your workplace? Thematic coding was used to analyse the data. Three themes were identified: different perceptions influenced female teachers' experience of aggression; the pressure in the school system formed an integral part of the experience of aggression and the experienced effect of aggression on the female teachers.

Changes in Children’s Autonomous Motivation Toward Physical Education During Transition From Elementary to Secondary School: A Self-Determination Perspective

2015 ◽  
Vol 34 (3) ◽  
pp. 442-460 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cindy Rutten ◽  
Filip Boen ◽  
Nathalie Vissers ◽  
Jan Seghers
Keyword(s):  
Physical Education ◽  
Secondary School ◽  
School Environment ◽  
Autonomous Motivation ◽  
Perceived Competence ◽  
Self Determination ◽  
Mediation Analyses ◽  
Perceived Need ◽  
Need Support ◽  
Perceived Relatedness

Based on Self-Determination Theory (Deci & Ryan, 2000), this study tested whether changes in autonomous motivation toward physical education (AMPE) during the transition from elementary to secondary school can be predicted by changes in perceived need support from the physical education (PE) teacher and perceived physical school environment. Self-reported data were gathered from 472 Flemish (northern part of Belgium) students in 6th grade (2009) and again in 8th grade (2011). Mediation analyses showed that an increase in perceived need support from the PE teacher was related to an increase in AMPE (boys: β = .42; girls: β = .50). In boys, this relation was mediated by changes in perceived competence (β = .08). In girls, this relation was mediated by changes in perceived autonomy (β = .12), perceived competence (β = .14), and perceived relatedness (β = .05). This study shows that PE teachers should be need-supportive to maintain a good quality of motivation in students.

scholarly journals Learner pregnancy in secondary schools in South Africa: Have attitudes and perceptions of teachers changed?

2020 ◽  
Vol 85 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Letlhoyo Segalo
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Secondary Schools ◽  
School Environment ◽  
Basic Education ◽  
Teaching Experience ◽  
Research Approach ◽  
School Teachers ◽  
Life Orientation ◽  
Attitudes And Perceptions ◽  
Purposive Sample

Many secondary schools in South Africa have elaborate school policies on learner pregnancy. Many of these policies state that in the event of a female learner falling pregnant, the said learner will be suspended from the school. The application of these policies has been challenged in the courts of law either by the parents of the learners or the Department of Basic Education in South Africa. The study used a qualitative research approach to explore the perceptions of Life Orientation teachers with regards to learner pregnancy policies and their efficiency. A purposive sample of nine Life Orientation teachers was chosen, and a focus group was used to collect data from the respondents. There were five female and four male teachers in total who participated in the study. Their age ranged from 27 to 52 years with an average teaching experience of 15.3 years. The study showed that despite the legislation stating that schools should be supportive of the needs of the pregnant learners at the school, teachers interviewed demonstrated their unwillingness to adhere to the law. As a result, pregnant learners are advised or coerced to stay at home for the remainder of their pregnancy as the school environment is not tolerant towards them.

Apartheid Aesthetics and Insignificant Art

2016 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-69
Author(s):  
Stephanus Muller
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Secondary School ◽  
South African ◽  
Cultural Production ◽  
Art Songs ◽  
Cultural Significance ◽  
European Culture ◽  
Small House ◽  
The Rich ◽  
Selection Of

Stephanus Le Roux Marais (1896−1979) lived in Graaff-Reinet, South Africa, for nearly a quarter of a century. He taught music at the local secondary school, composed most of his extended output of Afrikaans art songs, and painted a number of small landscapes in the garden of his small house, nestled in the bend of the Sunday’s River. Marais’s music earned him a position of cultural significance in the decades of Afrikaner dominance of South Africa. His best-known songs (“Heimwee,” “Kom dans, Klaradyn,” and “Oktobermaand”) earned him the local appellation of “the Afrikaans Schubert” and were famously sung all over the world by the soprano Mimi Coertse. The role his ouevre played in the construction of a so-called European culture in Africa is uncontested. Yet surprisingly little attention has been paid to the rich evocations of landscape encountered in Marais’s work. Contextualized by a selection of Marais’s paintings, this article glosses the index of landscape in this body of cultural production. The prevalence of landscape in Marais’s work and the range of its expression contribute novel perspectives to understanding colonial constructions of the twentieth-century South African landscape. Like the vast, empty, and ancient landscape of the Karoo, where Marais lived during the last decades of his life, his music assumes specificity not through efforts to prioritize individual expression, but through the distinct absence of such efforts. Listening for landscape in Marais’s songs, one encounters the embrace of generic musical conventions as a condition for the construction of a particular national identity. Colonial white landscape, Marais’s work seems to suggest, is deprived of a compelling musical aesthetic by its very embrace and desired possession of that landscape.

Can Virtual Replace In-person Coaching? Experimental Evidence on Teacher Professional Development and Student Learning in South Africa

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jacobus Cilliers ◽  
Brahm Fleisch ◽  
Janeli Kotzé ◽  
Nompumelelo Mohohlwane ◽  
Stephen Taylor ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Professional Development ◽  
South Africa ◽  
Language Proficiency ◽  
Oral Language ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
Reading Proficiency ◽  
Home Language ◽  
Oral Language Proficiency ◽  
Virtual Coaching ◽  
Negative Effect

Virtual communication holds the promise of enabling low-cost professional development at scale, but the benefits of in-person interaction might be difficult to replicate. We report on an experiment in South Africa comparing on-site with virtual coaching of public primary school teachers. After three years, on-site coaching improved students' English oral language and reading proficiency (0.31 and 0.13 SD, respectively). Virtual coaching had a smaller impact on English oral language proficiency (0.12 SD), no impact on English reading proficiency, and an unintended negative effect on home language literacy. Classroom observations show that on-site coaching improved teaching practices, and virtual coaching led to larger crowding-out of home language teaching time. Implementation and survey data suggest technology itself was not a barrier to implementation, but rather that in-person contact enabled more accountability and support.

scholarly journals Systematic Review of Alexithymia in the Population of Hemodialysis Patients

2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (13) ◽  
pp. 2862
Author(s):  
Đorđe Pojatić ◽  
Ivana Tolj ◽  
Davorin Pezerović ◽  
Dunja Degmečić
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Literature Review ◽  
Web Of Science ◽  
Major Effect ◽  
Hemodialysis Patients ◽  
Bibliographic Databases ◽  
Inclusion Criteria ◽  
The Matrix ◽  
Negative Effect ◽  
Bodily Sensations

Alexithymia is a construct defined as the inability to differentiate between emotional experiences and bodily sensations. According to existing knowledge, alexithymia may have a major effect on the process of treatment and the outcome of the hemodialysis disease. The objective of this literature review was to determine the significance that alexithymia has for compliance and variables of clinical and mental health in the population of hemodialysis patients. For the above purpose, bibliographic databases “MEDLINE” and “Web of Science” were searched. The matrix method was used in analysis of articles. Searching both databases resulted in 248 articles. After applying exclusion and inclusion criteria, we included results of 13 articles in the literature review. The results of the search are findings regarding the prevalence and correlation of alexithymia with variables of clinical and mental health in hemodialysis patients. Alexithymia is significantly more common in the population of hemodialysis patients, and it has a negative effect on their mental and somatic health. Alexithymia levels in hemodialysis patients are more pronounced in cases where there is a greater number of comorbidities. Alexithymia is the predictor of high mortality rate in the population of hemodialysis patients, independent of other comorbidities.

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