8 research outputs found
E-Learning change management and communication strategies within a HEI in a developing country: institutional organisational cultural change at the University of the Western Cape
The paper attempts to report on the strides that UWC has achieved in the
adoption of eLearning among the campus teaching community, namely the
academics from across different faculties, in order to supplement their traditional
face-to-face instruction. The qualitative approach was predominantly used. The case
study methodology was uniquely applied in this paper because it was used in
collaboration with documentary analysis to highlight the achievements and
challenges encountered in the adoption and implementation of the existing homegrown
Open Source eLearning system. A multi-dimensional non-coercive eLearning
implementation approach was used highlighting the various communication and
change management strategies that the institution has employed in its endeavours to
achieve broad eLearning buy-in within a resistant environment. A generic
Instructional Design Model was developed to portray a continuum in the support
for a changing organisational culture. The results indicated that the institution has
realised a 26% success rate of academics who have managed to have experienced a
paradigm shift towards the use of Information Communication Technologies (ICTs)
in supplementing their teaching practices
The Grenadian Revolution, 1973-1983 The political economy of an attempt at revolutionary transformation in a Caribbean mini-state
SIGLEAvailable from British Library Document Supply Centre- DSC:D66165/86 / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo
Striving for a better world: Lessons from Freire in Grenada, Jamaica and Australia
The author of this paper considers the influence of Paulo Freire’s pedagogical philosophy on educational practice in three different geographical/political settings. She begins with reflections on her experience as a facilitator at Freire’s seminar, held in Grenada in 1980 for teachers and community educators, on the integration of work and study. This case demonstrates how Freire’s method of dialogic education achieved outcomes for the group of thoughtful collaboration leading to conscientisation in terms of deep reflection on their lives as teachers in Grenada and strategies for decolonising education and society. The second case under consideration is the arts-based pedagogy shaping the work of the Area Youth Foundation (AYF) in Kingston, Jamaica. Young participants, many of them from tough socio-economic backgrounds, are empowered by learning how to articulate their own experiences and relate these to social change. They express this conscientisation by creating stage performances, murals, photo-novella booklets and other artistic products. The third case study describes and evaluates the Honey Ant Reader project in Alice Springs, Australia. Aboriginal children, as well as the adults in their community, learn to read in their local language as well as Australian Standard English, using booklets created from indigenous stories told by community Elders, featuring local customs and traditions. The author analyses how the “Freirean” pedagogy in all three cases exemplifies the process of encouraging the creation of knowledge for progressive social change, rather than teaching preconceived knowledge. This supports her discussion of the extent to which this is authentic to the spirit of the scholar/teacher Paulo Freire, who maintained that in our search for a better society, the world has to be made and remade. Her second, related aim is to raise questions about how education aligned with Freirean pedagogy can contribute to moving social change from the culture circle to the public sphere