Reactions and understanding of the selected teachers in the integration approach to teaching and learning. Integration is one of the approaches in the current curriculum of South Africa and the Philippines.
Focus of the research
The purpose of this interview is to gather information and compare the implementation process of the integrated curriculum of fourth grade English curricula in the two countries. Study limitations are to be expected in this research because there may be other confounding variables that may be overlooked.
Research questions
Research design and methodology
Limitation of the study
The description of the sample or the participants of the research study is also mentioned in this chapter. Comparative results of the implementation process in the two countries' current curriculum integration are shown in this chapter.
Defining integrated curriculum
The above definitions support the view that integrated curriculum is an educational approach that prepares children for lifelong learning. Beane (1996) explains that the integrated curriculum involves a completely different theory of curriculum and learning than the subject area approach.
How integrated curriculum works
How the teachers use the integration method
In the field of using the integration method in teaching, the selected teachers of the two countries have reflected on their individual ways of teaching English using the integration method. According to the selected South African teachers, they integrate other subjects into assignments and exercises such as letter writing, essay writing, spelling, reading contests, vocabulary research work and projects. They link the learning topics or learning contents of the subject matter being taught to the subject matter that is integrated into lesson discussions or learning applications, such as training exercises and group activities, so that teaching and learning are always integrative. .
They use it as motivation at the beginning of the lesson or use it as a presentation of the English class if they teach English as a subject. Other times, the selected teachers integrate other topics in the final part or in the learning application of the lesson, where students have to perform the various activities, such as lesson evaluation tests, drills, oral exercises and other group work activities. In the area of assessment in inclusive education, as it has been noted that most of the classroom teachers encounter some problems in assessing students (Mason, 1996 and Humphreys et al, 1981), the selected teachers in South Africa and the Philippines explained how they assess their students.
According to the selected teachers, they set learning objectives and criteria in different lessons and evaluate students according to the results of their performance and behavior in the classroom.
Problems encountered by the teachers during integration teaching
Another reason why teachers have difficulty using the integration method, as explained by the selected teachers in the two countries, is that the integration method was not used in the previous curriculum and subsequently they do not have the right amount of experience in integration education. . The selected teachers' difficulty in using the integration method reflects teacher training, which Roebuck and Warden (1998) noted as a problem in implementing an integrated curriculum. Apart from the problems in linking, connecting or integrating other subject areas into English lessons, the selected teachers in South Africa and the Philippines have the same problems regarding the time commitment in teaching English, which is insufficient if the integration method is used used.
Another problem encountered by the selected teachers in South Africa and the Philippines is the problem of assessing student performance and achievement. To overcome this problem, the selected teachers in both countries set learning objectives and criteria to focus on the lesson learning outcomes of the major subject being taught. Additional problems encountered and noted by the selected teacher in this study are within lesson activities.
The selected teachers in both countries noted some problems they encountered and these problems are indirectly related to the behavior of each student.
Support for the teachers in implementing the integration approach
In this case, the selected teachers in the two countries were interviewed regarding the support. During the activity time, the selected teachers noticed some obvious scenes of the students' reactions to group work. The selected South African teachers and the Filipino teachers have found similar ways to encourage their students to participate in group work.
By using exciting features during the activity, you can arouse students' interest in participating and participating in group work. For each student's personal reaction to inclusive teaching, the personal interest and motivation of students in the participating schools in South Africa and the Philippines increases. The various group activities in their integrated lessons are in the area of the students' experience, which makes it.
Many citizens in South Africa and the Philippines have a primary home language other than English, so most students also speak their home language in schools.
Conclusion
Regarding the negative comments of the selected teachers in both countries, which was documented in this research study, it is in itself evidence that there are problems in the implementation of the integrated curriculum. But these problems should not hinder the effectiveness of the integrated curriculum in developing the personality and potential skills of students, as well as in helping students to prepare for their future, and finally, that any external factor or related, which may affect their learning. progress is kept under control and should not be allowed to dominate students' abilities to develop mentally. On the positive side of teacher feedback, it has been shown that in the long term, the implementation of the current integrated curriculum in South Africa and the Philippines, which includes the final phase when all teachers in both countries, including the teachers participating in this study, have been trained properly, continue to receive the full support of all relevant parties, have secured sufficient resources and are fully adapted to the curriculum change process; all students will eventually find that they have been subjected to the best possible ways of educational teaching using the integration method, which at the end of the students' schooling days will produce responsible, knowledgeable and well-rounded citizens.
Summary of the study
Using the integration method to teach the various subject areas at all grade levels is one of the policy instructions in the current curriculum in the two countries, and it is a mandate for all teachers to teach using the integration method (South Africa's RNCS, 2002 and Philippines' BEC Executive Order, 2002). In order to identify and clarify the various issues in the implementation of the integrated and the effectiveness of the integration method in teaching, this research study was initiated with the aim of making a comparison in the implementation of the current curriculum integration in the two countries that led for identification. and clarification of problematic areas in the implementation process. A decision was made to select some selected schools in South Africa and the Philippines as sites for the research study and certain teachers who teach English as a subject in grade four classes in these selected schools are participants in this study.
The questions were typed in a questionnaire form and since South Africa is a long distance away from and has a different time zone than the Philippines, the interview questionnaires for the selected Filipino teachers were sent by post and returned to the researcher in the the same way (Routio, 2004). The selected teachers in both countries responded to the requests of the researcher to answer all the questions in the interview questionnaire with as much detail and explanations as possible, and therefore the data collection was generally successful and comprehensive. The data collected in South Africa were only analyzed since the researcher collected the interview questionnaires in person, while the data from the Philippines took a little longer to arrive due to the long distance from that country to South Africa using the postal services.
When the data from these two countries were analysed, they were compared with each other in terms of their differences and similarities, and these comparisons were considered to reflect issues that had arisen since the implementation of the integrated curriculum.
Research finding
Then, to add to the problem of time allocation, there are often insufficient teaching materials and modern teaching devices that can be used to support integrative teaching by selected teachers in both countries. Another point raised included the issue of teacher support in the implementation process also mentioned by selected teachers in South Africa and the Philippines. But in the research, it was observed that the selected teachers from South Africa have received extra.
The selected teachers in the two countries agreed that integration is an effective teaching method as they noticed an increase in students' performance and achievements. The selected teachers in South Africa and the Philippines noted the various challenges related to the implementation of the integration approach in the current curriculum through their responses based on their classroom experiences. However, some of the teachers' answers are not clear enough to identify the problem in the integrated curriculum, i.e.
What other support do you have in the implementation of your current curriculum with specific reference to the integration approach to teaching and learning. How do you assess the learning achievement and performance of your learners in the integration education. The research project is a comparative study of the selected grade four English curricula in South Africa and the Philippines which implements the integration method in the integrated curriculum as one of the approaches in teaching and learning in the two countries' current curriculum.
