The purpose of this set of Content Descriptions is to provide a resource for curriculum developers in higher education institutions engaged in developing or revising their initial teacher education curriculum for primary school literacy teachers who will on graduating teach reading and writing in the various South African official languages. A first consultative workshop on a Draft Curriculum Framework for literacy teaching in Initial Primary Teacher Education was held on 25 and 26 January 2019 and this version of the Content descriptions was revised subsequently.
Presentation made by the Consolidated Literacy Working Group of PrimTEd to the PrimTEd Annual National Dialogue meeting called by the DHET on 17-18 October 2019 in Kempton Park
The purpose of this Framework is to provide guidelines for the professional development of competent educators who can teach reading and writing in the various South African official languages. It is aimed at the university teachers, leaders and support staff who are able to facilitate this development, and particularly language and literacy subject specialists. However, role players at all levels will be implicated in the implementation of this Framework. This framework has been presented at two national consultative meetings and is now in its sixth edition. A first consultative workshop on this Framework was held on 25 and 26 January 2019 and this version is the result of revisions based on recommendations from the workshop and other submissions.
The framework recognises that although learning to read is very similar across languages, differences in the way languages are structured and in their writing systems (orthographies) influence the reading process. The Framework seeks to help teachers and curriculum specialists understand that the reading approaches and methods on how to teach reading in African languages differs in some ways from English, especially with regard to the early stages of learning to read when children learn how to link letters to sounds, and to use this knowledge to read words (decoding). Currently, the influence of reading approaches used in English is so strong that it overrides the development of reading methods and pedagogies that are appropriate for African languages. The Framework unpacks the teaching of decoding skills (phonological awareness, phonics) and dense morphology that pose challenges for young children in the early stages of learning to read in African languages. The Framework emphasises that the morphological, phonological and orthographical features of African languages should be factored in the design of reading curricula, the development of teacher training programmes and assessment for African languages.
Towards an ITE literacy teacher curriculum: Component content descriptions
