An investigation into the effect of various levels of sanitation on surface

ThesisA growing need exists to assess the impact of urban and industrial development on the aquatic environment. Environmental strategies, which will result in an improvement of environmental quality without excessive cost, must be designed and implemented. In order to do this, it is important to identify sources of pollution, to quantify the possible pollutant load, and to identify such pollutants' pathways into the aquatic environment. The primary objective of this study was to investigate the effect of various levels of sanitation on the quality of urban storm water run-off. The Klein Modder River catchment, in the province of the Free State, South Africa, was selected as site for this study. Botshabelo is a large settlement in the catchment of the Klein Modder River. The city contains various types of developing urban profiles similar to those found elsewhere in developing urban areas in South Africa. The city has substantial shortcomings in sanitation that could lead to pollution of stormwater run-off. The pollution impact of three sub-catchments of Botshabelo, w here different levels of sanitation are being used , was investigated. The typical sanitation systems were waterborne sewage, bucket latrines and pit latrines. The pollution impact was evaluated by means of measured microbiological indicators, w hich are generally used to define the safety of surface water bodies for human contact. The flood peaks in each catchment were also calculated, and it was established that the hydrological variance, as a factor influencing the variability of the results, could be neglected. The conclusion reached was that the extent of pollution is clearly determined by the level of sanitation systems and the quality of the management of these systems

Relationships between mathematics and literacy: exploring some underlying factors

This paper focuses on Grade 7 learners in two township schools where the relationships between performance on language and reading tests in the home language and English were investigated in relation to examination performance in mathematics. In both schools reading ability rather than language proficiency in English emerged as a strong predictor of mathematics achievement. The schools serve as a case study for exploring some of the socio-economic, teacher and classroom factors underlying differential school performance in mathematics. Because the new curriculum presupposes a highly literate environment, it is suggested that mathematics learning will be negatively affected if learners lack adequate reading skills. The findings suggest that quality schooling is a strong determinant of both reading and mathematical achievement. The new mathematics curriculum has the potential to make a difference only if schools improve learners' literacy development

Supporting transition or playing catch-up in Grade 4? Implications for standards in education and training

This paper describes an intervention programme that was originally intended to support transition to English as language of learning and teachin

The socio-educational context of literacy accomplishment in disadvantaged schools: Lessons for reading in the early primary school years

Literacy does not develop in a vacuum. Reading is taught and is learnt within a social context, and the school and teachers are a central part of this context. This context will affect the way learners acquire literacy as well as the consequences of their literacy accomplishments within the learning environment. This article presents findings from a study that assessed Grade 1 learners' literacy accomplishments and examined the school literacy context as well as the literacy practices and perceptions of teachers in a primary school. The findings are discussed in relation to the broader school literacy environment and the learners' literacy achievements. The findings indicate that the acquisition of literacy skills is the product of a set of socio-educational circumstances that translate themselves into specific literacy environments for learners. The article concludes by identifying some implications that follow from the findings. Key Words: reading; literacy assessment; assessment standards; socio-educational context of literacy Journal for Language Teaching Vol.38(1) 2004: 45-6

Investigating the Comprehension Iceberg: Developing Empirical Benchmarks for Early-grade Reading in Agglutinating African Languages

RLOsReading development in agglutinating African languages is a relatively under-researched area. While numerous studies highlight the low comprehension levels among learners reading in African languages in South Africa, little has been done to probe beneath this ‘comprehension iceberg’ in terms of decoding skills

Inference generation in the reading of expository texts by university students

The continued underperformance of many L2 students at primary, secondary and tertiary level is a cause for grave concern in South Africa. In an attempt to better understand the cognitivelinguistic conditions and processes that underlie academic performance and underperformance, this study looks at the problem of differential academic performance by focussing on the inferential ability of undergraduate L2 students during the reading of expository texts. The study works within a constructivist theory of reading, where the successful understanding of a text is seen to involve the construction of a mental representation of what the text is about. Inferencing plays an important role in constructing meaning during reading because it enables the reader to link incoming information with already given information, and it enables the reader to construct a mental representation of the meaning of a text by converting the linear input into a hierarchical mental representation of interrelated information. The main finding showed that the ability to make inferences during the reading of expository texts was strongly related to academic performance: the more inferences students made during the reading of expository texts, the better they performed academically. This relationship held across the making of various inferences, such as anaphoric inferences, vocabulary inferences, inferences about various semantic relations, and thematic inferences. In particular, the ability to make anaphoric, contrastive and causal inferences emerged as the strongest predictors of academic performance. The study provides strong empirical evidence that the ability to make inferences during reading enables a reader to construct meaning and thereby also to acquire new knowledge. Reading is not only a tool for independently accessing information in an information-driven society, it is fundamentally a tool for constructing meaning. Reading and inferencing are not additional tools that students need to master in the learning context- they constitute the very process whereby learning occurs.Linguistics and Modern LanguagesD.Litt. et Phil. (Linguistics

A clinical and molecular investigation of two families with Simpson-Golabi-Behmel syndrome

Includes abstract (p. 30-32). Includes bibliographical references

Investigating the differential item functioning of a PIRLS Literacy 2016 text across three languages

The aim of this study was to determine whether a limited release literary text from the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) Literacy 2016 is equivalent across English, Afrikaans and isiZulu, three of South Africa’s 11 official languages. PIRLS is a large-scale reading comprehension assessment, which assesses Grade 4 students’ reading literacy achievement. PIRLS Literacy 2016 results for South African Grade 4 students indicated poor performance in reading comprehension, with approximately eight out of ten Grade 4 students who cannot read for meaning.  Descriptive statistics informed the Rasch analysis which was conducted using the South African PIRLS Literacy 2016 data. Even though the Rasch analysis indicated differential item functioning across the three languages for this specific passage, there was no universal discrimination against one particular language. By conducting differential item functioning, it was possible to determine whether the selected text had metric equivalence, in other words, whether the test questions were of similar difficulty across languages

Pitfalls and possibilities in literacy research: A review of South African literacy studies, 2004-2018

Background: Given the comprehensively documented literacy crisis in South Africa and the gaps in what is known about the effective teaching of reading and writing in schools, high-quality literacy research is a priority. Objectives: This article evaluates South African research from two annotated bibliographies on reading in African languages at home language level (2004-2017) and South African research on teaching reading in English as a first additional language (2007-2018). It also aims to provide guidelines for addressing these weaknesses. Methods: Examples of 70 quantitative and qualitative research studies from the annotated bibliographies were critically analysed, identifying key weaknesses in the research as a whole and examples of excellent quality. Results: Weaknesses evident in the research reviewed, suggested greater consideration is needed to lay sound methodological foundations for quality literacy research. Three methodological issues underlying local literacy research that require greater attention are research design, selection and use of literature and research rigour. High-quality research examples are referenced but, for ethical reasons, examples of what we consider to be flawed research are described generally. Guidelines are offered for addressing these pitfalls that, in our view, contribute to research of limited quality. Since many universities require submission of a journal article as a requirement for postgraduate students, preparation for such an article is considered. Conclusion: While this article is not intended to be a comprehensive guide, we hope it is useful to supervisors, postgraduate students and early career researchers currently undertaking, or planning to undertake, literacy research and to writing for publication