Abstract
Abstract : South Africa has made significant strides in addressing issues of historical imbalances by ensuring an increased representation of girls in high school science education. However, this study has noted that several challenges resulting in disparity in performance of different groups of learners still exist. Such learners are girls whose performance appears to be relatively poorer than that of their male counterparts as shown by the analysis of physical sciences National Senior Certificate (NSC) examination results for the past six consecutive years from 2012 to 2017. This study focuses on curriculum delivery practices as a possible cause of the observed disparity in performance. The aim is to illuminate areas of practice that may still be disadvantaging girls. This study will hopefully assist in mapping out a more effective solution to the comparably poorer performance of girls by highlighting aspects of curriculum delivery practices that are potentially in need of some adjustments. The term ‘curriculum delivery practices’ in this study, refers to everything that takes place during the interaction of learners with either the planned or official curriculum, especially at school levels. A critical investigation into classroom practices such as classroom interactions, teacher’s feedback to learners, monitoring of work by the teacher, participation of girls in practical activities, learners asking for assistance during times of struggle and learner engagement which focused on learners showing signs of withdrawal from the lesson was conducted. Lesson observations and semi-structured interviews of selected girls studying physical sciences and their teachers were used to collect data. An analysis of the data collected points towards the existence of less visible forms of discrimination against girls studying physical sciences at school levels. The less visible forms of discrimination embedded in curriculum delivery practices mentioned above were found to be preventing girls from actively and meaningfully participating in subjects such as physical sciences. In addition to highlighting the aspects curriculum delivery practices in place in some South African schools, it also became apparent through this study, that there were other factors that were not related to curriculum delivery practices that could have contributed to the observed disparity in performance. However, most of these nonacademic factors such as cultural gender stereotypes for example, were either directly or indirectly linked to curriculum delivery practices.
M.Ed. (Education)