The action research journey of Tshidi Hlapane, Deputy Chief Education Specialist
Every child learns at his own pace. Learners who need extra support often end up in support classes for the rest of their school career. Effective Individual Support Plans (ISPs) help to avoid this. Tshidi Hlapane is Deputy Chief Education Specialist of the Free State Province. She searched for solutions in her action research (AR) journey. ‘The fear of teachers towards officials often hides the real problem.’
Tshidi Hlapane is Deputy Chief Education Specialist for the Free State. She participated in the second VVOB action research (AR) cohort in her Province. Her AR question was ‘How can I support teachers to design Individual Support Plans (ISPs)?’
‘For the rest of their lives’
Some learners don’t get the necessary support from a regular classroom setting. They need further, intensive help of a support class. ‘According to the official Policy on Screening, Identification, Assessment and Support (SIAS), the purpose of these classes is to strengthen the learners,’ embarks Tshidi Hlapane. ‘So that they can go back to the mainstream classes.’ Individual Support Plans (ISPs) are necessary to make this work. This inspired Tshidi’s Research question: How can I support teachers to design an Individual Support Plan? ‘The opposite of what SIAS requires, was happening’, Tshidi explains. ‘Learners in support classes often stay there for the rest of their lives, without an Individual Support Plan.’
Here comes the police
During her first Action Research meeting, Tshidi learned that teachers or schools don’t see Provincial Officials in the way she thought they perceived her. ‘Whenever they see us entering the school gate, they think our goal is to police them.’ Conducting action research, involving teachers, has taught her a different way to approach schools. ‘When you come in with a monitoring tool and tell them “Sit down, I want to monitor your work”, this teacher will think “Oh my goodness, she is going to criticise me.”’ The fear that teachers still feel towards officials, is hiding the real problem. ‘We need to avail ourselves to these teachers. Here I am. Where are you stuck? How can I help?’
Impact
The Kirkpatrick model helps Action Researchers to structure levels of impact of their interventions, so that they can make sense of their progress. ‘I learned about the model during the AR workshops and it helped me a lot, because it shows the levels of change in behaviour’, Tshidi explains. ‘My school is at the first level. The teachers experience my support positively.'
An answer to her research question, Tshidi could not yet formulate. ‘Our pilot trajectory was only six months’, she explains. This was too short to reveal change at higher levels.
It’s all about the kids
South Africa’s number of learners has a pyramid form. ‘At the bottom, which is Grade 1, we have a huge number of learners. As we go up in Grades, the education pyramid grows narrow’, Tshidi regrets. ‘We must continue to ask ourselves: where are we losing our learners? We need to reach them with quality education, so they can grow as they are in Grade 1 up until they finish.’
