Teaching students with visual “disability”: the experiences of technical and vocational education and training (TVET) lecturers.

Abstract

The acceptance of students with “disabilities” into mainstream classrooms is a global issue. In South Africa, during the apartheid era, people with “disabilities” were segregated into their own schools, and did not receive quality education as their peers in mainstream schools. South Africa post- apartheid, with its democratic government created new policies, which were to address past apartheid oppression in its education system. Amongst other policies was an inclusive education policy, which advocates for the inclusion of students with “disabilities” into mainstream classes. A public Technical Vocational Education and Training (TVET) College in KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) has since 2015 enrolled students with visual “disabilities” as its initiative to implement the inclusive education policy. This resulted in the unexpected need for the lecturers to change their normal teaching strategies in order to accommodate these students. A study within the qualitative approach, using a case study methodology, was employed to gather data on the experiences of four TVET College lecturers teaching students with visual “disabilities”. Semi-structured interviews with four lecturers were used to generate data. Kolb’s Experiential Learning Theory underpinned this study and was useful in interpreting the experiences of TVET college lecturers. This study has revealed three major findings: the TVET College lecturers have never received any professional training to prepare them to teach these students. There are no resources currently available to teach students with visual “disabilities”. The lecturers received no support from management and the Department of Higher Education in teaching students with visual “disabilities”. Nevertheless, the lecturers have embraced this challenge and have found their own agency to cope with teaching these students despite all the challenges they have encountered from not being trained, battling with resources and not being supported.