Abstract
The aim of the study is to explore how grade one teachers understand and enact scripted home language literacy lessons that incorporate competencies for a fast-changing world. The South African education system is facing a challenge with the low literacy levels of its learners. One option to address the low literacy levels is to incorporate competencies for a fast-changing world. This study forms part of a larger research project titled Sandbox, led by the National Education Collaboration Trust (NECT) in collaboration with the Department of Basic Education (DBE) and the University of Johannesburg. Using a qualitative multi-site case study, the five grade one teachers’ understanding and enactment were documented across three iterations and formed the basis of the investigation. Drawing from Engeström’s (2001) third-generation cultural-historical activity theory (CHAT), I investigated the links between two activity systems, namely the grade one teachers’ schools and the NECT training. The five research participants’ experiences in the classrooms in Gauteng and Limpopo and in the NECT training, are explored to identify the tensions and affordances arising from teachers’ use of scripted lesson plans for literacy in combination with a lesson design frame that explicitly integrates competencies for a fast-changing world. Data was generated through observations, video recordings and stimulated recall interviews (SRIs). CHAT was used to interpret all data. I identified three main findings. The first finding confirmed that teachers grasped some competencies better than others which influenced their enactment in grade one literacy lessons. Secondly, I found that teachers’ prior knowledge and experiences combined with new learnings either prompted greater teacher agency or served as a barrier when planning and enacting scripted competency-based lesson plans. The third and final finding indicates that teachers’ experiences of the competency-based lesson plan training influenced how competencies were understood and enacted. The study concludes that the competency-based lesson plans provided an opportunity for teachers to apply the learnings in their specific contexts. Key to these findings was that the training provided the foundation upon which further learning was extended and built upon during the stimulated recall interviews.