Abstract
Computer literacy is the ability to use computers as tools. Computers affect peoples’ lives. Hodge and Miller (1997: [Online]) describe the impact of computers in people’s lives and indicate that “information and communication technologies are rapidly changing the way individuals live, firms do business, governments administer and nations interact.” Mangena, the Deputy Minister of Education, claims that, “today, basic computer literacy skills are becoming just as important as acquiring literacy and numeracy skills” (DoE, 2003: [Online]).
Increasingly, teachers are also expected to use ICT for their teaching, administration and also in the classroom. In the South African situation, many teachers are ill-prepared to use computers, as they have no experience or training in this regard. However, several training programmes exist that train teachers for Educational ICT. The ultimate aim is that teachers will transfer the skills acquired at such training programmes for teaching and learning in their own contexts. Hence, the purpose of this study was to explore the ways in which teachers transfer the skills that they learnt at a computer course to their work environment.
The main findings from data indicated that a number of factors and conditions influence the transfer of skills. Primarily, the course presenter’s style, course content, support from management and peers, time for practice, learning in context, students’ confidence, nature and scope of assessment, accessibility to resources and conditions under which students transfer skills, have great influence in the transfer of learning.
Prof. D. van der Westhuizen