Mishack Thiza Gumbo

Africanising the Curriculum: Indigenous Perspectives and Theories

I fully appreciate the need for a frank debate about “Africanising the curriculum” in our present internationalised context. Knowledges that crisscross the globe originating from one source of world, are re-presented and packaged as emanating from the superpowers of the rich and famous, paraded as evidence of legitimating motivations for ascendancy to the throne of privilege. The host sources of knowledge remain obliterated. This has been the history of conquest for centuries, where victors triumphantly exhibit their spoils of war: the vanquished are exhibited as spectacles of amusement and derision; their goods and property ceremoniously displayed as the new property of the conqueror. So too are the knowledge systems, stolen from one context, exposed in pageantries of arrogance and humiliation. This is a matter of power and privilege intersecting to mark the territory of new heroes and villains. The aftermath of conquest is usually characterised by the victor supposedly generously distributing the booties of conquest, which have included even the donation of whole geographic territories to loyal allies, the bestowment even of people into enslaved bondage, and the ripping asunder of family units as persons were degraded to the status of property and sold in the marketplace. Border crossings are usually about exploitation, and the powerless and conquered are silenced into subjugation. Their voices are relegated to whispers in the wind until new whirling spirits are activated to challenge the injustice. And hell has no greater fury than the rising of those who for centuries have been downtrodden, abused, and made to feel alienated. Their lashing out against the oppressors bears centuries of being muzzled. And the new war is waged. The target of bella nova is to claim back the stolen goods, to accentuate the need for redefinitions of the self, to campaign for a resurrection of the lost world.

Indigenous Technology in Technology Education Curricula and Teaching

The premise of this chapter is that indigenous technologies have a place in Technology Education, and a case is made for the integration of indigenous technology into Technology Education curricula. The potential outcomes are profound—students from both Western and indigenous cultures who are empowered to participate in the development and critique of technologies from multiple perspectives, widened scope for community participation in teaching and learning, and enhanced collective participation of the custodians of indigenous and Western knowledge systems. The implications of such an approach encompass content, materials and equipment, pedagogies and assessment. First, curriculum developers and teachers need to understand and commit to the value of an integrated approach.

Discovering Grade 8 Technology Teachers' Pedagogical Content Knowledge in the Tshwane District of Gauteng Province

Abstract This paper reports on a study conducted to inquire into Grade 8 Technology teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) in the Tshwane District of the Gauteng Province of South Africa. The research question addressed was: What is Grade 8 Technology teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge in the Tshwane District of the Gauteng Province? The need to address the research question was triggered by the researchers’ awareness that teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge is an important and under-researched area of Technology Education. PCK embodies the notion that the knowledge held by expert teachers represents a unique integration of their pedagogical techniques and their understanding of Technology subject content. To pursue this investigation, the researchers conducted interviews, observed teachers as they taught and reviewed the textbooks that the teachers used. Interestingly, the findings revealed significant diversity in the teachers’ PCK – specifically in their understanding of Technology Education, the Technology Education curriculum, the pedagogy of Technology Education, assessment, resources, and indigenous technology. Finally, the researchers provide relevant recommendations.

Claiming Indigeneity through the School Curriculum, with Specific Reference to Technology Education.

Abstract The development of the new curriculum post-1994 was coupled with a strong drive towards recognising and affirming the critical role of indigenous knowledge, especially with regard to science and technology (World Intellectual Property Organization, 2006). In the light of this claim, the author of this paper critically examines, from a literature study point of view, the extent to which the technology education curriculum accommodates or integrates indigenous technologies as part of IKS. In fulfilling this purpose, the author clarifies the important concepts related to IKS that will facilitate an understanding of the said critical examination of the technology education curriculum. These concepts include indigenous, culture, indigenous people, indigenous knowledge and Africanisation. The concept of indigenous technologies will be clarified later in this paper, under the relevant heading, since this is the main focus of the study. The paper also includes a section that argues the need for the curriculum to integrate IKS, and the author examines the extent to which the technology education curriculum integrates indigenous technologies.

A STAND-ALONE, BLENDED OR RESTRUCTURED INDIGENISATION APPROACH TO CURRICULUM? A CRITICAL PERSPECTIVE

ABSTRACT Attempts to come up with a relevant curriculum that responds to the African context, in general, and to Ethiopia, in particular, have been unsuccessful. The indigenisation approach has been applied in curriculum development and studies as a strategy for rehabilitating the knowledge base and perspectives of the neglected peoples in order to make their curricula relevant. Originally, the indigenisation approach involved a process of modifying a transplanted Western model to make it relevant to the importing countrys political and socio-cultural context. Now, it has transformed into an authentication or cultural validation approach that seeks authentic roots in the local system to construct a domestic model in the light of the social, cultural, political and economic characteristics and needs of a particular country. The problem addressed in this article is the lack of curriculum relevance to the Ethiopian socio-cultural and structural context which is hampering the countrys renaissance and development. This article employs a critical perspective to investigate the problem. A standalone indigenisation approach, which calls for rooting the curriculum in indigenous foundations and theories, as well as in principles and ideas derived from the culture, all followed by a blending approach which allows an intercultural dialogue, is suggested as being feasible. The authors argue that this approach is an alternative that can contribute towards ensuring the relevance of curriculum and the success of the African renaissance and development.

Identifying Grade 8 and 9 Technology Teachers' Areas of Need for Intervention in Limpopo Province

Abstract The aim of this article is to report the findings on the gaps that were identified in the teaching of technology by Grade 8 and 9 teachers at Mankweng Circuit of Limpopo Province. This was done so that appropriate action research-based intervention strategies could be embarked upon to fill these gaps. A reconnaissance or preliminary study as the first cycle stage of action research was instrumental in identifying these gaps. Observation, interviews and a questionnaire were employed in gathering data from the teachers from five sampled secondary schools. The findings revealed issues that have to do with technology teachers’ ability and capacity (knowledge on lesson planning, assessment, interpretation of curriculum policy and its implementation, resources) and those beyond teacher’ control (teaching experience, level of internal and external support, resources, tea cher-learner ratio). Identifying these gaps will help inform technology teacher practice about aspects of incapac ity and intervention to be considered.

Academic domains as political battlegrounds : a global enquiry by 99 academics in the fields of education and technology

This article theorizes the functional relationship between the human components (i.e., scholars) and non-human components (i.e., structural configurations) of academic domains. It is organized around the following question: in what ways have scholars formed and been formed by the structural configurations of their academic domain? The article uses as a case study the academic domain of education and technology to examine this question. Its authorship approach is innovative, with a worldwide collection of academics (99 authors) collaborating to address the proposed question based on their reflections on daily social and academic practices. This collaboration followed a three-round process of contributions via email. Analysis of these scholars’ reflective accounts was carried out, and a theoretical proposition was established from this analysis. The proposition is of a mutual (yet not necessarily balanced) power (and therefore political) relationship between the human and non-human constituents of an academic realm, with the two shaping one another. One implication of this proposition is that these non-human elements exist as political ‘actors’, just like their human counterparts, having ‘agency’ – which they exercise over humans. This turns academic domains into political (functional or dysfunctional) ‘battlefields’ wherein both humans and non-humans engage in political activities and actions that form the identity of the academic domain.

Pedagogical Principles in Technology Education

In this chapter, the author proposes principles that should be considered when teaching technology in indigenous contexts. The chapter is not about educational technology, computer integrated teaching or information and communication technology.

Applying Design and Technology Education in Addressing Farmers' Problems in the Makonde Rural District, Zimbabwe

Abstract This paper reports on the results of a developmental and participatory research study that is coupled with a significant, ongoing and long-term community development project in the Makonde Rural District, Northwestern Zimbabwe. From the beginning, this project has involved the application of Design and Technology Education in problem-solving with the intention to help farmers develop a sustainable localised model of technology for the processing and production of maizemeal, peanut butter and cooking oil. Following design principles adopted from literature, various machines were designed and developed for the purpose. The results and findings reported here include those drawn from the scientific/technical observations made during the development of these machines, followed by the interviews conducted with participants/end users.

Assessing second phase high school learners' attitudes towards technology in addressing the technological skills shortage in the South African context

Abstract This article argues the case that the decline in the numbers of school leavers entering science, technology, engineering and mathematics study courses worldwide and in South Africa in particular, is linked to negative attitudes towards Technology. The issue is regarded as critical since a negative trend in new entrants into the technology sector contributes to the technological skills shortage experienced locally and abroad. The purpose of the research was to determine learners’ perception of the concept of technology in general; their current attitude-status on seven dimensions of attitude towards technology; and factors that affect attitude. To this effect the article reports on the results of a technology perceptions-and-attitudes survey (derived from the PATT-US attitude-questionnaire) conducted on 95 Grade 10-to-12 learners during the 2009 National Science Week initiative held in the Northwest Province of South Africa. The initiative was hosted to promote science and technology awareness amongst the school going youth of the Northwest Province. The Grade 10-to-12 group included in the research represented future school leavers in the Northwest Province who would possibly consider entering into a technological career. The results of the study indicated that age, gender and grade-level of learners presented as factors that statistically significantly affected attitudes towards and perceptions of technology. The findings of the study raised the question whether the various dimensions of attitudes measured in the study influence learners’ choice of a career in technology in different ways.