The introduction of outcomes-based education from 1998 marks a watershed in the history of education in South African schools. Every new modification of the educational system – and there have been many – have retained OBE principles and features. Methods of educating as well as the content of subjects and learning areas underwent large-scale change. Along with all secondary school educators, history educators were swept along by this tide of educational change. Most educators found it difficult to keep up and cope with the changes, as the interim syllabi gave way to Curriculum 2005 and OBE, to be followed by the General Education and Training band (GET), the Further Education and Training band (FET) and the National Curriculum Statement (NCS).
Lifelong learning, flexible education and training structures, the integration and transfer of learning, the need to teach towards critical cross-fields and specific outcomes and the need to develop learner competence are the principles which are emphasised in OBE.22 Mazabow notes that OBE places great emphasis on learning outcomes.23
22
C. Lubisi, et al., Understanding Outcomes-Based Education: Teaching and Assessment in South Africa:
According to the Revised National
Learning Guide (Cape Town, 1998), p. 56.
Curriculum Statement a learning outcome is defined as ‘a description of what (knowledge, skills and values) learners should know, demonstrate and be able to do’.24
OBE is geared towards social transformation. The future role that learners will play after completing their formal school education is central to the OBE approach. The economic, social and political needs of the country were included in the formulation of the learning outcomes. Mazabow points to the Senior Phase (Grades 7–9) Policy Document which notes that learners should be ‘empowered through the internalization of competencies to contribute to the development of the country’.25 The Curriculum Framework for General and Further Education and Training expresses the desire that learners ‘articulate, activate and energise rigorously, the South African perspective of transformation’.26
The OBE approach argues against the content-based teaching approach of the past which has been perceived to neglect the needs of learners, the community and the business sector.27 OBE argues in favour of empowering learners and emancipating critical skills and attitudes, to assist learners in constructing their own meanings and knowledge and assisting them to become competent citizens.28 The OBE approach is learner-centered, rather than teacher-centered. Learners assume the central position and educators become organisers and facilitators in the learning experiences of the learners.29
Assessment methods which are based primarily on rote learning and memory work are questioned by OBE. The progress of a learner is measured rather in terms of the effectiveness of the practical application of the skills which they have been taught. The personal performance of
24 Department of National Education, Revised National Curriculum Statement (Pretoria, 2002), p. 14, as quoted
by Mazabow, ‘The Development of Historical Consciousness’, p. 17.
25
Department of National Education, Department of Education. Senior Phase (Grades 7- 9) Policy
Document (Pretoria, 1997), p. 8, as quoted by Mazabow, ‘The Development of
Historical Consciousness’, p. 18.
26 Department of National Education, Curriculum Framework for General and Further Education and
Training (Pretoria, 1996), p. 17, as quoted by Mazabow, ‘The
Development of Historical Consciousness’, p. 18.
27 African National Congress (ANC), Policy Framework for Education and Training (Pretoria, 1995), p. 17, as
quoted by Mazabow, ‘The Development of Historical Consciousness’, p. 18.
28
Department of National Education, Revised National Curriculum Statement R–9 (schools) (Pretoria, 2002), p. 12, as quoted by Mazabow, ‘The Development of Historical Consciousness’, p. 18.
the learner is critical, rather than the traditional method of being measured against the performance of others.30 The Curriculum 2005 Assessment Guidelines notes that the assessment should ‘help students to make judgements about their own performance, set goals for progress and improve further learning’.31
An OBE curriculum model possesses certain advantages. Clearly stated outcomes and assessment criteria mean that learners know what is expected of them and can assess their own progress. Learners are provided with support especially in terms of the assistance of peers in learning situations. Learners cannot fail in the sense that they enjoy further opportunities to meet required standards. Understanding concepts is considered more important than rote learning and simply absorbing disparate facts. Real-life knowledge, skills and values are emphasised, rather than an artificial classroom situation.32
The new Curriculum 2005 had many positive features in general as well as for history education. The break which it provided with old authoritarian learning systems of the past was welcome, as were its commitment to equality in learning and training, its recognition of the need to create better opportunities for entrance into every level of teaching and training; its greater recognition of skills and qualifications in work-related training, its encouragement of lifelong learning, its promotion of a more direct relationship between learning and training, the more rational integration of knowledge and skills in various learning areas, its emphasis upon cooperative learning, its promotion of critical thinking and civic responsibility, as well as its recognition that some knowledge and understanding of history was important and was included in the school syllabus.33
Perceived weaknesses of OBE have been identified. The OBE concept has been seen as a theory which was developed in other countries and then transplanted to South Africa. There were few, if
30
Mazabow, ‘The Development of Historical Consciousness’, pp. 18–19.
31 Department of National Education, Curriculum 2005 Assessment Guidelines (Pretoria, 2002), p. 18, as quoted
by Mazabow, ‘The Development of Historical Consciousness’, p. 19.
32 H. Van der Horst and R. McDonald, Outcomes-Based Education: A Teacher’s Manual (Pretoria, 1997), pp.
14–16, as quoted by Mazabow, ‘The Development of Historical Consciousness’, p. 141.
33
M. Legassick, ‘Statement by the South African Historical Society on the Implications of Curriculum 2005 for History Teaching in the Schools’ Kleo, 30 (1998), p. 6.
any precise and definite answers as to what is to be achieved. Issues such as the importance of acquiring much needed social values such as non-racism were not included in the curriculum. The Curriculum Review Committee, which was commissioned by Minister of National Education, Kader Asmal, to review Curriculum 2005, found that educators, officials, managers and learners were confused, and did not understand what was expected of them. Other complicating factors around OBE and Curriculum 2005 included too many design features, lack of specifications, too much complex and difficult terminology, too many learning areas, a lack of effective implementation of techniques, not enough resources such as textbooks and stationery and not enough provision of effective in-service training for educators.34
Legassick noted that there were certain areas in which Curriculum 2005 did not advance the teaching of history in particular. A chronological framework, or context of the past needs to be provided so as to understand the interactions of people and the forces of change at particular times. The design of the learning programmes with their accompanying specific outcomes, range statements and assessment criteria made it difficult for history to be taught and learned in this way. Insufficient care had been taken in the use of documents as a method of understanding and analysing the past and in considering different interpretations of history. Very little about human agency was apparent in the documents, which led to the idea that change was something that occurred subject to fixed laws in a mechanistic and deterministic way. Legassick felt that the way in which the concept of identity was presented in the curriculum did not break with the South African patterns of the past which viewed communities as fixed and unchanging. Even though a somewhat wider definition of community was allowed for, human agency was again neglected.35
In Mpumalanga, reactions to the introduction of OBE were overwhelmingly negative among educators in all subjects, including history.36
34 Legodi, ‘The Transformation of Education’, pp. 184–185.
My own observations confirm the well-worn criticisms leveled against OBE and Curriculum 2005, as outlined above. Educators complained unceasingly about the fact that OBE was essentially an educational import and that it did not suit
35
Legassick, ‘Statement by the South African Historical Society’, p. 8.
36
The Nkangala region of Mpumalanga is referred to, especially the Middelburg, Witbank/Emalaheni and Hendrina areas.
local conditions, whatever these were perceived to be. The system was perceived to be very difficult to implement. OBE was seen to be a watering down of traditional academic study, to be less factual and subject to the imposition of an individual educator’s nebulous personal values. More than anything, this researcher perceived an intense reluctance on the part of educators to deal with the prospect of change. Departmental training seminars which were organised to train educators in the new ways of OBE were poorly attended, and those educators who did attend often displayed negativity, pre-judging the courses even before they began. OBE was in reality perceived to be a full frontal attack on educators’ professional comfort zones. Despite the perceived shortcomings of OBE and Curriculum 2005, the new educational approach did have merit, but most educators never gave either approach a fair and open-minded chance.
Schoeman and Manyane mention the often-aired apprehension that existed within the history educating profession as to whether educators would be able to master the new OBE approach to history education and teach the subject successfully in their classrooms.37 These concerns arose at a time when learner support material was lacking and when educator training seemed inadequate and inconsistent.38
Many secondary school history educators found that the OBE approach was indeed conducive to history teaching. OBE methods had in any event already been used within history classrooms by educators who had tried to make use of various sources to teach the subject and who attempted to encourage learners to self-explore the syllabus content. As Legassick has pointed out, many features of OBE suit history education at secondary schools.39
37 S. Schoeman and R.M. Manyane, ‘Understanding the Introduction of Outcomes-Based History Teaching in
South Africa’ Educare, 31, 1 & 2 (2002), p. 177, as quoted by Mazabow, ‘The Development of Historical Consciousness’, p. 19.
38
Mazabow, ‘The Development of Historical Consciousness’, p. 19.