LITERATURE REVIEW
2.4 THE FOUNDATION PHASE
2.4.2 The Foundation Phase Learner
Many studies have recognised the relationship between low socio-economic conditions and learners’ academic performance (Dahl & Lochner, 2005; Gershoff, Aber, & Raver, 2003;
Hartas, 2011; Mayer, 2002). Findings from research have suggested that as a family’s earnings escalate there is an affirmative influence on the learner (Costello, Compton, Keeler, & Angold, 2003; Gershoff et al., 2007; Morris & Gennetian, 2003).
There is a strong correlation between the time and money parents spend on children and their academic performance (Gershoff et al., 2007). This is not necessarily so with direct parental support. For example, parents’ support with learners’ homework does not necessarily stimulate the learners’ general academic progress (Dickinson & Tabors, 2001). Studies conducted by Cooper, Lindsay and Nye(2000) with families from a wide-range of backgrounds showed that parents assist their child with homework when they experience academic difficulty in school.
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A study by Reynolds, Mavrogenes, Bezruczko and Hagemann (2008) revealed that children’s reading and Mathematics attainment at age twelve was higher if they had parental support between the ages three and four. The research conducted by Martlew, Ellis, Stephen and Ellis (2010) on active learning reported that learners from socio-economically advantaged homes had more ‘talk experiences’ than learners from less advantaged homes. Talk experiences are opportunities for learners to discuss what happened at home or at school. They recommend that relevant stakeholders take consideration of this when preparing and implementing innovative curriculum reforms so that suitable provision can be provided to those learners’ that require it the most (Martlew et al., 2010). It is more challenging to teach learners in the Foundation Phase who do not have the support from their parents as it requires greater effort from the teacher.
Although characteristics such as socio-economic background, ethnic background or sex influences learners’ participation in science lessons, Andrée (2012) argues that to understand learners’ participation in science lessons the activities that learners are engaged in needs to be analysed. Brophy (1986) established, “Achievement is influenced by the amount of time that students spend engaged in appropriate academic tasks” (p. 1079). Learners need to be actively involved in the teaching and learning process. Andree’s study considered how changing the circumstances of classroom activities could increase learners’ participation in science learning.
Johnston (2005) maintains, “The more child-centred, exploratory experiences children have the greater their scientific development is likely to be” (p. 3). According to Brophy (1986), learners gain knowledge more effectively when their teachers initially organise new information for them and help connect it to their prior knowledge, along with supervising their performance and supplying remedial advice. He maintains that the accomplishment of superior level learning objectives is not easy to attain through discovery learning. Instead, it will require considerable teaching by an experienced teacher, “following thorough mastery of basic knowledge and skills that must be integrated and applied in the process of higher-level performance” (Brophy, 1986, p. 1076).
Charlesworth and Lind (1995) describe precise learning practices with young children as “naturalistic (or spontaneous), informal, or structured” (p. 22). These involvements vary with respect to the person guiding the experience, which could be the teacher or the learner.
Naturalistic experiences are those in which the “child controls choice and action”
(Charlesworth & Lind 1995, p. 23). Naturalistic experiences are instinctively instigated, as learners are involved in the world around them. According to Charlesworth and Lind,
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naturalistic experiences are a main method of learning for young children and consequently are appropriate as a way of “defining the learner-controlled science process skill experiences”
(1999, p. 23). Learning Outcome One in Natural Science affords the teacher the opportunity to incorporate these learning experiences into scientific investigations.
The function of the teacher in a naturalistic experience is to afford abundant and diverse activities, which relate to the learners’ investigations and to do so with encouragement.
In informal experiences, the learner selects the activity and action, but the teacher intercedes at a certain stage. Informal experiences are when the learner and teacher “share control of the learning activity” (Charlesworth & Lind, 1995, p. 24). These cooperative communications are impulsive and may transpire after the learner reaches out to the teacher for involvement or once the teacher detects an occasion to support or work in an appropriate concept. The role of the teacher in an informal experience is to observe the learner’s experience and choose at what time they ought to give their encouragement to change or improve a learning experience.
The Teacher’s Guide for the development of the foundation phase learning programmes provides a detailed description of the characteristics of learners in the Foundation Phase. Since the different aspects of development i.e. physical, emotional and intellectual are not synchronised, this needs to be considered when planning the teaching and learning for children in this phase (Department of Education, 2003a, p. 19). Learning needs to be structured so that it is age appropriate and at the correct level to ensure successful learning takes place. Each learner works at his or her own pace and needs to be allowed time to complete tasks set.
Moreover, their attention span is limited and hence they find it difficult to remain quiet for a length of time. Learning that is targeted at a level too low or much higher than their capability could lead to discipline problems (Andrée, 2012). Learners in this phase have a natural curiosity to learn and they come to class with their own prior knowledge, even though it is limited and are enthusiastic about learning (Department of Education, 2003a). In keeping with this, Hattie (2003) declares that what learners bring to the class plays a “very important part in determining the learners’ success” (p. 2). Victor and Kellough (2000) concur that teachers not only need to promulgate learners’ natural curiosity but they need to find ways to preserve and nurture it so that effective teaching can take place. The main characteristic of the foundation phase learner is their natural curiosity, which provides a platform for teaching and learning to occur.
Throughout the primary years of schooling, learners are enthusiastically involved in attaining essential concepts in addition to gaining essential process skills. Children discover
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the world with their senses by looking, touching, smelling, hearing, and tasting. They are instinctively inquisitive and want to identify everything in their environment. Johnston (2005) maintains that children should be permitted and stimulated to physically collaborate with their surroundings and discover scientific phenomena. As children grow and are able to move around on their own they become unrestricted to learn further on their own and start to reason for themselves. They start to create ideas and thoughts all through the primary school phase.
In addition, children improve the procedures and practices, which allows them to exercise their recently attained ideas, develop current ideas and develop innovative ideas. When children arrive in the Foundation Phase from grade R to Grade Three, they apply their initial, elementary ideas while discovering additional abstract investigations and concepts in Science (Charlesworth & Lind 1995). The learners continue to investigate and explore as the initial stage in understanding the new situation in which they find themselves. They do this by applying fundamental concepts and process skills such as collecting and organising data to respond to a query. Research reported by Lederman, Bartels, Lederman, and Gnanakkan, (2014) with first-grade learners revealed that science teaching and learning must start at an early age to ensure that scientifically knowledgeable people are developed (p. 45). Their study showed that young learners are able to develop an understanding of the nature of Science. The foundation phase teacher should take cognisance of this when planning the teaching and learning experiences for their learners.