Geography teachers’ reflections on teaching topography.

Abstract

In view of the scant existing research on topography teaching, this study focused on how topography is taught in South African schools and aimed to fill this gap by exploring geography teachers’ reflections on teaching topography in four schools in Chatsworth. This dissertation adopted an exploratory case study rooted within the interpretive paradigm. It explored geography teachers’ reflections on teaching topography to understand their reflections, what informs them, and what we can learn from them. This exploration therefore necessitated the use of the interpretive paradigm. The study used reflective activity and semi structured interviews to draw out teachers’ reflections on teaching topography. The convenience and purposive sampling techniques were used to select the geography teachers from whom the data to fulfil the aims of this study was generated. The study employed the guided data analysis approach to analyse the elicited data. The reflective activity and interview questions used to obtain teachers’ reflections on teaching topography were underpinned by the guiding questions of the curricular spider web concepts. The findings of this study indicate that geography teachers mainly engage in practical reflection when evaluating their teaching of topography. It appears that teachers are largely impelled by their professional rationale in their reflections. Thus, their teaching of topography is mainly guided by the prescriptions of the curriculum policy rather than their personal perspectives or societal needs. As such, teachers adhered to the guidelines of the Curriculum Assessment Policy Statements (CAPS) curriculum when deciding what to teach (content), when to teach (time) and how to teach it (teaching goals). However, the findings of this study further indicate that teachers’ compliance to the predetermined standards of the intended curriculum (professional rationale) made teachers unable to transform topography curriculum to suit learners’ needs. Therefore, it is suggested in this study that teachers draw from all three teaching rationales (personal, professional, and societal) for a balanced implementation of topography where teachers’ personal perspectives, professional knowledge, and societal needs are considered in topography teaching.