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This paper highlights the methodology that has been used at Rhodes University and other South African universities in implementing vocation-specific African language learning programmes. Essentially, the paper links the curriculum design to the theoretical paradigm of interculturalcommunication. Intercultural theory is used as a basis to develop vocation-specific courses where language and culture are taught, for example, to second language learners of isiXhosa at Rhodes University. These courses include courses for Pharmacy and Law students. This paper offers a new theoretical paradigm for intercultural language teaching. Furthermore, examples from specific courses are provided in order to illustrate how this theoretical paradigm can be implemented in a practical way. The impact of multilingualism and intercultural communication in the wider legal and healthcare work environment in South Africa is also discussed.Keywords: vocational language learning, indigenous African languages, multilingualism, intercultural communication, cultural awareness, cultural sensitivity, legal professional, health-care professional, law, pharmacy

Academic literacy development within the secondary schooling system in South Africa has reached crisis proportions, with a large number of students exiting the system unable to function adequately within the tertiary sector or labour market. Attempts to remedy this crisis by introducing curriculum reform over the past few years have yielded little success, with universities having to take on the literacy problem by offering a variety of remedial programmes to ensure that students are equipped to access learning and succeed at their studies. Research shows that most literacy intervention programs at universities appear to favour a more traditional approach to English academic language development by focusing on grammatical rules, sentence structure, spelling and punctuation. This bottom-up approach does not necessarily equip students with the skills needed to write coherent and cohesive extended pieces of writing as required by university assessment processes. For this reason, the Reading to Learn (RtL) methodology was chosen to be implemented within a writing module at the University of KwaZulu-Natal and within selected Grade 11 classes in the Winelands District in an attempt to find an alternative approach to academic literacy development. The purpose of this article is to offer a comprehensive synthesis of some of the theoretical assumptions of RtL as well as its practical implementation before embarking on an evaluative study of this methodology in future papers. In doing so, this article offers a brief discussion on academic literacy pedagogies and situates RtL within these frameworks. This is followed by a synthesis of the practical implementation of RtL and a discussion of the works of Halliday (1989, 1996), Vygotsky (1978) and Bernstein (1990, 1996) which have had an influence on the development of RtL.Keywords: academic literacy, Reading to Learn, academic reading and writing pedagogies, genre pedagogy, scaffolded learning

The higher education landscape in South Africa has recently changed with the new National Qualifications Framework, leading to the introduction of four-year degrees in all four radiography disciplines. Additionally, there have been developments in the extension of roles in radiography, while the need for interdisciplinary practice has also been emphasised. The Professional Board for Radiography and Clinical Technology (PBRCT) of the Health Professions Council of South Africa is currently revising the scope of the profession which will now include extended roles. However, the extended role concept in radiation therapy has not received the attention similar to Diagnostic/Medical Imaging. The aim of this paper is, therefore, to provide concept clarification and key considerations for developing a postgraduate curricular framework for training radiation therapists to practise in the envisaged extended roles. For this narrative review, a Boolean search for advanced practice and role extension in radiation therapy was done on all databases (43) available on EbscoHost to source for peer-reviewed articles published between January 1950 and September 2020. A total of 17 articles met the inclusion criteria and were used to frame the discussion. Advanced practice emerged as the more suitable concept as it goes beyond an extension of tasks to include critical characteristics that are necessary to drive transformation in the local social, professional and educational arenas. It is envisaged that some of the key points discussed in this paper could assist the PBRCT in thinking about the implementation of the proposed extended roles for radiation therapists in South Africa.

The 2015–2016 South African higher education student movements evoked critical conversations regarding the extent to which institutions of higher learning have transformed into democratic and inclusive spaces. One of the key gaps in this field is the paucity of research that explores the potential role of theology in steering the direction of transformation in South African higher education system. Through a Wesleyan approach, the paper argues that the four quadrilaterals of the Wesleyn approach, scripture, tradition, reason and experience will be used as a theological tool to weight beliefs in the levels of dogma and doctrine, opinion and so as not to confuse critical reflection with negativity and judgmentalism in critically reflecting on the South African higher education struggles for transformation and decolonization. In our attempt to contribute meaningfully to the broader debates, started by scholars such as Nadar and Reddy ( 2015 ) and more recently, Phiri and Nadar ( 2018 ), who locate their work in theology to think through gender, curriculum and African feminism differently, counter-hegemonically. In this paper, we aim to contribute to this emerging body of work by arguing that theology has a critical role to play in helping us to imagine what a transformed, inclusive and socially just higher education could look like.

In bilingual classrooms, content is often learned simultaneously with a new language. Recent applied linguistics research has identified shifts in discourse made by teachers and learners as they work towards these two goals. Departing from a sociocultural perspective on teaching and learning, this study assumes learners and teachers bring rich and diverse linguistic repertoires to the classroom. This paper examines selected episodes of discourse shifts which took place in a week-long mathematics enrichment programme run by a non-government organisation in rural South Africa. In this Xhosa-English bilingual context, I undertook a small-scale ethnographically-informed case study in which evidence of and comment on discourse shifting was collected in the form of video and audio recordings of lessons and interviews with participants. The focus of the analysis is on the translanguaging strategies (especially register meshing) of the teacher and a learning facilitator as they work to make the curriculum accessible to the learners. The argument made in the paper is that the unidirectional notion of discourse shifting from more everyday, spoken, home language discourses to more discipline-specific, written, English discourses is not adequate in explaining the complex multidirectional shifting apparent in my data.

Very little research has been devoted to evaluating the national English Home Language (HL) curriculum and assessment system. Not only is there a lack of clarity on whether the language subject is being offered at an adequately high level to meet the declared objectives of the curriculum, but the reliability of the results obtained by Grade 12 learners in the exit-level examination has been placed under suspicion. To shed some light on the issue, this study takes a close look at the language component of the school-leaving examination covering the period 2008-2012, to see whether evidence of high language ability can be generated through the current selection of task types and whether the inferred ability can be generalised to non-examination contexts. Of primary interest here are the validity of the construct on which the examination is built and the sub-abilities that are being measured, as well as the validity of the scoring. One of the key findings of the study is that the language papers cannot be considered indicators of advanced and differential language ability, only of basic and general proficiency. The lack of specifications in the design of the examination items and construction of the marking memoranda undermine the validity and reliability of the assessment. As a consequence hereof, the inferences made on the basis of the scores obtained by examinees are highly subjective and cannot be generalised to other domains of language use. The study hopes to draw attention to the importance of the format and design of the examination papers in maintaining educational standards.

The focus of this paper is an analysis of the conceptualisation of language teaching and the construction of learners in the new National Senior Certificate grade 12 curriculum and examinations taken by students for whom English is an additional language. The paper examines the values, attitudes and beliefs, as well as the required levels of cognitive engagement and notions of reading and writing. The authors argue that the curriculum represents a significant improvement on the previous version. However, there is a considerable mismatch between the Curriculum Statement and the examination papers. The curriculum emphasis on the role of language as a tool for critical, independent thinking is not evident in the examination papers, which reinforce traditional gender norms and essentialised notions of Africa. The examination papers are cognitively undemanding, requiring only the most basic understandings of texts. The authors argue that, by making it possible to pass at a very basic level, the examination system in effect obscures the contradiction that although the majority of learners have to use English as a first language across the curriculum, the language itself is taught as a second language.

The silence about employers’ perspectives on the employability of newly qualified Social Work graduates from the largest open distance-learning university in South Africa was highlighted as the problem for this study. Underpinned by the theory of collaborative advantage as the theoretical framework adopted for this study, and following a qualitative research approach, the researcher entered into a research partnership with the social work fraternity. The aim was to explore employers’ perspectives on the employability of Unisa’s newly-qualified social workers and to gather suggestions for promoting graduates’ employment, and accordingly informing Unisa’s social work curriculum. This paper reports on these perspectives and suggestions.

Gardner’s multiple intelligences can directly link with the subjects or the curriculum taught in school. The focus in this paper is on Foundation Phase learners and their personal favourite subjects. In allowing learners to choose what they find the most interesting, the most popular subject is identified and new perspectives are provided on which areas should need attention. The method involved is a quantitative approach incorporating statistics obtained through a Likert scale. 105 participants were involved and interesting views surfaced. Literacy is no longer at the top of the list of most popular subjects, a concern for teachers who aim at teaching learners to read and write as Art is found to be the most popular subject. Fusing Art and other forms of intelligences can be employed as a strategy to teach literacy and popularise it. Opsomming Gardner se onderskeid tussen multi-intelligensie tipes can direk in verband gebring word met die vakke wat op skool onderrig word. Die fokus in hierdie navorsingsstuk is op die Grondslagfase en die leerders se persoonlike gunsteling vakke. Nuwe lig op populere vakke word gewerp deur leerlinge die geleentheid te bied om hulle persoonlike voorkeur uit te oefen. Hierdie metode stel navorsers instaat om vas te stel wat om te doen om die probleem van swak geletterdheid aan te spreek. ‘n Kwantitatiewe metode is gevolg om leerderkeuses te identifseer en resultate is in present weergegee. 105 deelnemers was betrokke en interessante perspektiewe het aan die lig gekom. Gelletterdheid is nie die gewildste vak nie en Kuns is een van die Grondslagfase leerders se voorkeure. Indien kuns dan ingespan kan word in ander vakke as deel van integrasie kan dit moontlik die leer in daardie vakke bevorder. https://doi.org/10.19108/KOERS.83.1.2218

This article argues that the Zimbabwean high school curriculum has remained largely irrelevant to human resource needs for professions that draw expertise from African languages, such as teaching, translating, broadcasting and interpreting. Despite some curriculum reforms after the attainment of political independence, effects of colonial language policy and language planning with regard to the Zimbabwean education system seem to have remained intact. As a result, observations have been made that the system continues to churn out Africans who are still deeply rooted in the belief that the study of foreign languages, English in particular, prepares them for a better and brighter future than African languages would. The belief is largely that a pass in English guarantees them better, higher-paying, more prestigious and more readily available jobs than would African languages. The education system in Zimbabwe today, this paper argues, has negative perceptions and attitudes towards the study of African languages. African languages-related professions are therefore filled by people with little or no sound background knowledge in the area. In addition, those who end up being absorbed in professions that draw from the African languages area, in most cases, are not satisfied. The same can be said of most other African countries that were subjected to colonialism in the past and neo-colonialism today, under the vague and obscure concepts of globalisation and modernisation. Against this backdrop, the article advocates for the re-engineering of the Zimbabwean school core-curriculum by incorporating mandatory study of an indigenous language, at least up to ‘O’ level, in a bid to preserve and promote African languages and at the same time meet human resource needs of professions that draw from the discipline over time.

This article is the introduction to the James Alfred Loader Dedication. It consists of a tribute to Professor Loader’s academic contribution to Old Testament, Middle-Eastern religio-literary studies and the Rabbinical background of the Old- and New Testament. The article is modelled after the tribute published in German in the annual publication of the Evangelisch-Theologische Fakultät Wien (Vienna, Austria) due to the honorary doctorate conferred on Professor Loader by the University of Pretoria (South Africa) in 2009. The tribute is combined with a comprehensive curriculum vitae, in part written in German, Afrikaans and English, and consisting of referencing Professor Loader’s personal data, his role as minister of religion, his academic awards, participation in scholarly societies, professional academic positions, academic reviewing, editorial activity, presentation of academic papers and a list of publications.

The aim of this paper is to present the perceptions of social work educators on the relevance of feminism in the undergraduate curriculum. An exploratory pilot study was conducted among ten social work educators from four universities (two in Gauteng and two in Limpopo province) on factors that motivate educators to incorporate feminism in the curriculum. Purposive sampling was employed to select educators who are involved in teaching direct practice with individuals and groups. Unstructured interviews were used to elicit qualitative data from the respondents. The major findings revealed that educators have divergent opinions on the incorporation of feminism in social work training. Even though the results are incon-clusive, different views expressed by educators necessitate future in-depth research in this area.

The importance of Church History and Church Polity in the training and forming of theological studentsThe Nederduitsch Hervormde Kerk always has always been adamant that its ministers should be trained and formed in a theological faculty at a recognized university, where all the disciplines of theology are lectured. At a recent Church synod, the importance of Church History was questioned. In this paper the argument that Church History is not just important in the curriculum of theology, but indeed indispensable, is put forward. As Church Polity forms part of the Department of Church History at the Faculty of Theology (University of Pretoria), it is also included in the argument.

The research reported here examined the engineer occupational course curricula presented by the South African Army School of Engineers. Methodology involved examination of all enabling learning objectives for the Corps Training Course (701 ENGR 006), the Troop Officers Course (701 ENGR 103), the Troop Commanders Course (701 ENGR 16) and the Squadron Commanders Course (701 ENGR 17). The research determined the number of learning objectives dedicated to terrain analysis and whether those learning objectives were linked to an assessment to determine competency levels for terrain analysis. The study used content analysis to determine the presence of terrain analysis content in the course curricula and to make recommendations. Data have been collected from analysis of the first four occupational course curricula presented to officers of the Engineer Corps as mentioned above, books, army field manuals and occasional papers. Recommendations are that the learning objectives dedicated to terrain analysis should be expanded and better focused and that assessment instruments capable of measuring competency in terrain analysis should be created and/or improved. An additional recommendation is that exercises are needed during the occupational courses that require officers to assimilate the effect of terrain on operations in order to improve officers’ terrain analysis competencies. This will serve as an important assessment instrument that will improve development of officers’ skills and earn them experience, not just grades.