SUBDELEGACIÓN DEL GOBIERNO COMUNIDAD VALENCIANA

This section closes the findings on the objective which wanted to find out whether colleges of education adequately equip student-teachers with diverse teaching methods to enable them to teach DCE fruitfully. The findings reflect mixed views on the matter. A part of findings show that colleges have a well-equipped methods course in the Social Studies course. This course exposes student teachers to diverse teaching methods, techniques and strategies. On the contrary, the other portion of findings shows the unattractive look of Social Studies classrooms. This outlook is dominated by the hegemony of teacher-centred methods.

Therefore, it can be concluded that, the state of teacher training curriculum for citizenship education at college level has an unattractive outlook. Simply put, while majority of lecturers indicated that they use active methods to teach DCE concepts, their students in the sample denied such a claim. Thus, it can be argued that failure by lecturers to be exemplary in terms of the

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usage of active and interactive methods of teaching have far reaching consequences. These are student-teachers and thus if they are familiarised with a practice there is a chance that they would carry it over to schools after completion. In this case, if teachers are familiarised to passive methods during their training that is what they would take home and this would devastate Botswana’s goal of DCE.

Effectual teacher training is made obligatory by reason that teachers have the opportunity to leave a permanent thought on their students’ lives. Such experiences mould, shape and can influence how children view themselves inside and outside school. These school memories have the probability to last a life span in students’ minds and can play a consequential role with present and future decisions. As a matter of fact, effective attitudes and actions employed by teachers can eventually make an optimistic difference in the lives of their students.

Based on the above observation, colleges need to create space to offer DCE in a less expensive but active way. DCE deserves outdoor and therefore active teaching approaches which colleges could fully adopt and utilise. Botswana has a lot of natural and man-made features which could be taken advantage of. Additionally, there are several social and cultural groupings, government departments, parastetal organisations, non-governmental organizations, which could be visited to provide the needed data in a practical form. At these institutions colleges could also arrange for short term placement of their students, however short they may be, to gain practical experiences on the ground. This goes in harmony with the principles of Education for Kagisano (1977), that the implementation of democracy in education has implications for the stakeholders, teachers and the curriculum. The education policy advocates for the involvement and voice of all stakeholders such as the community, parents, professionals, corporate world and students into education matters for the effectual build-up of well rounded, sound, accountable and responsible citizenry.

Additionally, Social Studies lecturers could work towards the establishment of a positive classroom climate. Positive classroom climates have potential to enhance academic performance and cultivate development of knowledge, skills and dispositions necessary in a democratic society. For instance, when Social Studies incorporates active learning strategies linked to

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community-based experiences results may show a greater demonstration of civic knowledge, skills, dispositions and engagement. Even within a classroom, activities such as debates, role- play and mock trials can encourage an individual’s active construction of knowledge through participation in activities that are meaningful to a democratic society. This argument is based on the fact that instructional methods and approaches that foster civic related knowledge engage students in activities that promote a range of academic competencies. Hence, classroom instruction that explicitly focuses on meaningful civic content is a critical element for student’s citizenship and enhanced learning.

Findings show that colleges which formed the research sites do not fully apply themselves regarding material development to support DCE. I argue that a lot of avenues are available which colleges have not tapped into before conclusions are made on the lack of resources. For instance, colleges could solicit printed material from organisations and institutions that relate with DCE content. These include hand-outs from parliament, councils, political parties, non-governmental organisations, etc. In most cases these organisations will not even sell the material as some material are often used for marketing purposes. In addition, they could explore the possibility of developing a bank of resources. This could be done by downloading from internet information that they could either directly use or modify for use in their transmission of DCE content. This should not be a problem since both colleges have access to internet facilities where they could retrieve information.

While it might be true that colleges have shortage of educational material, this study blames colleges of education for the shortages of instructional material for DCE. I argue that these are teacher training colleges at which trainees are taught about material development for instructional purposes. These are colleges at which teachers are trained by well-educated lecturers on how to be creative and innovative in times of need. These are colleges where future teachers are prepared to fit into any duty station in Botswana and apply themselves fully. Student-teachers are equipped to find themselves in a place with limited recourses and generate resources to facilitate effective learning and teaching. It is therefore surprising for teacher training colleges to have a shortage of recourses when lecturers and student-teachers could join hands and generate materials suitable for DCE. A strategy where colleges could be given an

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opportunity to generate their own teaching material without depending on the department of curriculum development, material production division could work.