Personal opinions about learning in Physical Sciences

Table 4.7: Keywords used to describe feelings when working with Physical Sciences educator

Positive feelings Mixed feelings Negative feelings

Like; friendly Happy Relaxed Inspired (twice) Grateful: thankful Confident

Like, moody Some educators are better

Scared

Nothing less, nothing more

Eight participants described working with their educators with positive feelings and emotions.

The findings suggested that they enjoyed working with their educators. Vuyani said “I like working with my science teacher, he is friendly”. Luyolo agreed with Vuyani by saying “I feel quite good because I was happy with them and even now I am happy”. Some participants preferred working with their Grade 10 educators to their Grade 12 educators; Noluyanda said

“I feel happy working with my grade 10 teacher”. Some participants portrayed feelings of relaxation and inspiration. Siphosethu said “I feel relaxed when I work with him” and Fezile said “She inspires confidence in me and always helps me”. Sisipho echoed Fezile‟s sentiments by saying “She inspires confidence in me and always helps me”. Another participant expressed sentiments of gratitude. Nosipho said “I feel grateful and thankful to her and encouraged by her”. Afika said “I was confident working with her”.

One participant expressed mixed feelings about working with the Physical Sciences Educator. Nomawethu said “I like working with her, but she could have done more and be more approachable. She was moody, she is like the weather”. This reflected unpredictability of her teacher.

Three participants expressed negative feelings about working with their Physical Sciences educator. Yanga felt that some teachers are better. Yanga has been exposed to extra tuition at Go For Gold. Khaya said “I was scared of our teacher, she was bitter, she answers harshly”. Thulisile was equally not happy about working with her teacher, she said “I was normal, I expected nothing much and nothing less. I expected her to do things as she normally does, nothing exciting, everything average”

participants from all the four participants from School A and all four participants from School B, while the four participants from School C were all negative.

The participants really liked being cared for by the educator. Yanga exclaimed “She does care, wow. She is caring a lot. She wants a person who is willing to learn. She will do whatever is in her powers to help you, even if it‟s not about Physical Sciences. She helped me register for NBT tests”. NBT tests are National Benchmark Tests that the learners write at various Universities, these test the learners aptitude and are used in the selection of learners by the universities for certain courses. These tests can also be used to support the learner academically once they are selected for a certain course. The idea for a caring, helpful, inspirational and approachable educator was appreciated by most participants. Vuyani said

“Our Grade 12 teacher, I would say he is a good teacher and is inspirational. Playing a big role in doing the subject”, his sentiments were echoed by Luyolo who said “The teachers are patient and kept themselves busy with us so that we can understand. They don‟t want to leave the learner without understanding”. Siphosethu is happy because “They are people that can be approachable, they make sure that if I didn‟t get something, they explain it, they make sure that I do understand what they are teaching in front of the class, they are passionate about it. Science teachers differ, in Physical Sciences, it‟s an enjoyable class.

There are no other ways of doing this thing”. Participants were also happy when the educator made work to be easier, Fezile said “My teacher is a good teacher. She does her work. She makes things become easy”.

Four participants were unhappy about their educators, and all four of them were from School C. Afika said “She was not explaining well. The teacher is not approachable, her face is always angry”. Afika was supported by his classmate Khaya who said “The teacher didn‟t help us much to be honest. The class is disruptive so all the time when the teacher is standing in front of us there are casualties and learners make noise and silly comments, so our teacher decided to sit and not teach, just write notes and classwork on the board and sit down and let us do it on our own”. Thulisile was more critical of their educator when she said

“She tried to make the subject more interesting at some point, but at some point we get we get demotivating from my teacher, but we tried to push ourselves. She is very discouraging and shouting”. Her views were echoed by Nomawethu who said “No, she is a difficult person;

she does not know how to explain. She doesn‟t answer questions, she always says , I don‟t know”.

4.9.2 Learners‟ advice to educators

The participants offered advice to educators. Multiple participants advised educators to connect theory to practical. From the analysis of the learners‟ comments, it is evident that

many educators do not link theory with practical work; Vuyani said “Teachers must do more practicals because some students understand that part of the subject by doing practicals”.

Vuyani‟s sentiments were echoed by Yanga who said “Too much theory does not help.

Teachers need to do informal experiments to help learners”. Sisipho also felt that “Teachers should do more practicals”. Khaya felt that in addition to practical work, extra lessons are also needed; he said “We need to do more practicals, if we did more practicals and afternoon lessons every day, people will like Physical Sciences and understand it better”. Another dimension was added by Afika who felt that besides doing more practical work, educators need to be patient and also answer learners‟ questions. Afika said “We need to do more practicals, if we did more practicals and afternoon lessons every day, people will like Physical Sciences and understand it better”. Afika‟s statement shows that some educators are not patient, which is a worrying thing especially when dealing with a challenging subject like Physical Sciences.

Another advice that came up was that educators needed to be polite and patient when dealing with learners. Luyolo said “Teachers must be polite when they teach children and have time to just make learners feel comfortable”. This statement tells us that at times learners feel uncomfortable because of the way educators treat them. Luyolo‟s sentiments were echoed by Noluyanda who said “Teachers should be more patient because we are not all active to get something quickly, we need time to think and understand it”. This statement made me wonder if educators were not impatient with slow learners. This was because another participant had similar sentiments, Siphosethu said “I must say, they must be more patient to their students and sometimes make jokes, because when a teacher makes jokes about something in class, it‟s easier to get that knowledge, even if that teacher asks you about it the following day, it won‟t be difficult to understand”. Similar statement was said by Nosipho when she said “Teachers need to be patient, and need to work together with learners and give learners a chance to see what the subject is about. Sometimes it‟s frustrating and it needs a lot of time”.

Fezile advised educators to start from basics, he said “Teachers should start with basics and move to difficult ones”. Thulisile was frustrated that educators come to lessons ill-prepared.

She said “Teachers should come ready for class to teach and should have more examples for each topic. At first I thought Physical Sciences was not that difficult, but as time goes because of the teacher, I thought it was the most difficult. Lots of lessons were not well prepared”