HIV/AIDS education in Butare-Ville secondary schools (Rwanda) : analyzing current pedagogic discourse using a Bernsteinian framework.

Abstract

HIV/AIDS Education in Butare- Ville Secondary Schools (Rwanda): Analyzing current Pedagogic Discourse using a Bernsteinian framework. This thesis is concerned with the questions of "the what and how of HIV/AIDS school education". This study is located in three secondary schools in Butare-Ville, Rwanda, which were selected to show the picture of current pedagogic practices of fighting the pandemic in various schools. The first part of the study is concerned with the analysis of National policy of HIV/AIDS education of grade 9. This analysis examines how HIV/AIDS education is planned and integrated in various school subjects and what the Ministry of Education's policy is on how it should be implemented. I examined the instructional and regulative discourses within the national policy. Through curricula of other subjects which integrate into HIV/ AIDS education, I also examined how the knowledge of instruction is organized in terms of vertical and horizontal organization. The second part of the study is concerned with how the National HIV/AIDS Policy of HIV/AIDS education is transmitted in the classrooms in terms of classification and framing. In consideration of how students are educated about the disease, I explored students' grouping in terms of gender for getting knowledge and life skills to protect themselves from the pandemic. The theoretical resources for the analysis are drawn from Bernstein. The contribution of this thesis is two-fold. Firstly, it offers methodological techniques for evaluating of HIV/AIDS discourse with regard to how it is constructed and distributed in the classroom using a Bernsteinian framework. Secondly, the thesis points forward to further research in HIV/AIDS education for change in curriculum and pedagogic practices.