MATERIALES RESIDUALES SÓLIDOS CON CONTENIDO RADIACTIVO

This section deals with putting into operation the Conceptual Framework for evaluating the Expressive Arts ‘enacted’ curriculum. Productive Pedagogies was chosen mainly for analysis of pedagogy in the enacted curriculum of Expressive Arts. This framework was used because Illuminative Evaluation as a framework for evaluating a curriculum has no specific analytical criteria that could have been used to analyse the Expressive Arts curriculum, especially the enacted curriculum. The theory offers a good lens for evaluating a curriculum which was introduced to improve the quality of education in Malawi. The theory enables the study of the intellectual quality of lessons.

This complementary framework is introduced in the following section and a detailed discussion of how it was operationalised for data analysis is presented in section 5.6.3 of Chapter 5, the methodology chapter.

3.5.1 Productive Pedagogies

The notion of Productive Pedagogies emerged from the School Reform Longitudinal Study (SRLS) which was conducted in Queensland Schools, Australia between 1998 to 2001 (Zohir et al., 2010). The theory was developed by Lingard et al. (2001). The theory emerged as a research tool for exploring classroom practices that promote a high quality education for all students, regardless of background. The Productive Pedagogies theory consists of twenty pedagogies that have been broken down into four main dimensions, namely intellectual quality, connectedness, supportive classroom environment and engagement with difference (re-worked and adapted to working and valuing differences by some authors who used the theory after 2001, such as Zohir et al. (2010). As indicated earlier on above, a detailed discussion of the four dimensions of Productive Pedagogies and how they were put in operation for data analysis is presented in section 5.6.3 of Chapter 5, the methodology chapter.

The sub-section that follows looks at some of the studies which have utilized dimensions of Productive Pedagogies to evaluate curriculum implementation.

3.5.2 Studies using Productive Pedagogies

Productive Pedagogies has widely been used internationally to evaluate the implementation of curricula at classroom level. Studies which have used Productive Pedagogies to ground their enquiry of the implementation of curricula have revealed that the practice of four dimensions of Productive Pedagogy is very low amongst teachers of different curricula. This study was conceived out of the assumption that teachers of

Expressive Arts may or may not be integrating dimensions of Productive Pedagogies which, as has been argued earlier in this study, enhances attainment of high intellectual quality skills amongst the learners, thereby improving the quality of education, which is the main goal which the government in Malawi, as has been seen in Chapters 1 and 2, intends to achieve through PCAR. Some of the studies which have used Productive Pedagogies approach to evaluate curricula follow.

Productive Pedagogies has been employed by Zohir et al. (2010) to explore classroom practices of Malaysian secondary school Geography teachers. Findings of the study indicated that the practice of four dimensions of Productive Pedagogy is very low among Malaysian Geography teachers. The study found that there were very limited intellectual quality, connectedness, supportive classroom environment and recognition of difference activities in the classroom of the Geography teachers. The teachers were observed to have been using more traditional teacher-centred methods in which there were very limited interactions between the teachers and the students.

Productive Pedagogies has also been employed by Ishak (2010) to evaluate classroom practices of Malaysian secondary school Science teachers. Findings of the study indicated that the practice of Productive Pedagogy is generally very low among Malaysian Science teachers. However, the teachers were observed to promote engagement with difference, particularly practices that respect racial and ethnic backgrounds of students in class were observed to be strongly evident in the lessons observed in the study.

Productive Pedagogies has again been employed by Hayes, Mills, Christe and Lingard (2001) to evaluate the classroom practices of teachers in Australia. Findings of the study indicated that the Productive Pedagogy practices of Australian teachers was generally very low, with engagement with difference or valuing and recognizing differences as the least

emphasized dimension by the Australian teachers. However, a supportive classroom environment was observed to be strongly evident in the lessons observed in the study.

3.6 Closing remarks

This chapter has described the research frameworks that guided this study. Illuminative Evaluation (Parlett and Hamilton, 1976) and Productive Pedagogies (Lingard et al., 2001) were chosen as the main conceptual frameworks to guide the study.

The chapter has explained some of the reasons for choosing these frameworks, the most salient one being that the frameworks enable the description and explanation of the major facets of Expressive Arts, namely the plan or the ‘intended’ curriculum as stipulated in the state curriculum policy documents on one hand and the ‘enacted’ curriculum or what happens in the classroom in the actual teaching of Expressive Arts on the other hand, and a description or explanation of the relationships between the two facets. It is hoped that by adopting the Illuminative Evaluation and Productive Pedagogies as the main conceptual frameworks for this study, I should be able to contribute knowledge about how teachers implement curriculum reforms in Malawi through the evaluation of the Expressive Arts, through documenting the subject matter and teaching strategies in the ‘intended’ and the ‘enacted’ curriculum.

The illuminative evaluation studies cited in the chapter have shown that illuminative evaluation has been widely used both in Africa and internationally to evaluate education programmes. The findings of the studies have revealed that there is often a gap between the intentions of programmes and what happens in the actual implementation of a programme. This study was conceived out of the assumption that teachers may or may not be teaching Expressive Arts as intended by the national government, hence my attempt to establish, using tools of illuminative evaluation, if the learning area at this early stage is

being implemented more or less as intended. The studies have also shown that most of the studies used more than one method to carry out the evaluation. This study will also use an eclectic approach to evaluation of Expressive Arts curriculum because the methods provide for cross-checking of data, helping to validate the findings of the research.

In the chapter, the other theory used to support Illuminative evaluation has been described. This theory is Productive Pedagogies (Lingard et al., 2001). In the chapter, the other theory used to support Illuminative evaluation has been described. This theory is Productive Pedagogies (Lingard et al., 2001). This theory was used mainly to determine and document content knowledge, pedagogy and assessment in the enacted curriculum. The chapter argues that no such study, utilizing these two important frameworks to evaluate the teaching of a new curriculum has been done before in Malawi. This study was conceived to fill this knowledge gap.