Abstract
This research sought to investigate the learning difficulties that are faced by learners from child-headed households. Despite these learners having parents that are alive, some of them tend to be left to raise and take care of themselves because the parents are too busy, which leads to no educational support from their parents. Most studies in South Africa focus on child-headed households as children with no adult figure in the household and neglect those who have living parents with no involvement in their day-to-day upbringing. This study was motivated with the desire to investigate the educational experiences of learners that have to raise themselves due to no parental support and how the educational challenges faced by these learners can be turned into learning opportunities. The study was conducted using a qualitative approach and design. The study further used the constructivist theory, which assumes that learning is a social process where cultural symbols and sign play a major role for children to construct their own ideas and when left alone with no parental guidance to mediate the world for them, they are left to make the sense of the world alone, thus impacting their learning ability. Purposive sampling was used to select the nine participants in the study. In-depth interviews were used to gather data, together with a focus group. Data was analysed using thematic analysis.
The results of the study indicated that despite these learners having parents, being left to navigate life on their own severely affects their learning capabilities. This has left them encountering various academic challenges in the classrooms. The findings revealed that educators try to mediate on how they can best assist learners with learning difficulties in mainstream schools, however, lack enough training to do so. Educators try and find ways they can use to help these learners to academically improve, which includes the use of ISPs, group work, curriculum differentiation, etc. However, the lack of training and support received by educators make it difficult for them to fully assist these learners. Specific training is therefore required from the district-based support team (DBST) to better equip educators with the necessary tools of how to deal with these learners in their classrooms.
This study was successful in providing an in-depth description of the academic experiences faced by learners from child-headed households in the Gauteng mainstream primary schools. The results of this study cannot however be generalised to a larger population such as other primary school areas, since this study was
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conducted in an affluent area. Further studies are required to explore the larger context of children heading homes in the presence of parents that are alive and how this has largely impacted them academically.
Keywords: learning difficulty, child-headed households, mainstream primary schools, district-based support team, school-based support, School Assessment Team.