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Dealing with incidents of serious disciplinary problems amongst learners: A comparative study between South Africa and selected countries
Get PDFTeachers in South African schools battle with problems in learner discipline. Research indicates that teachers are at a loss as to handling these situations. The aim of this article is to survey incidents of serious learner misconduct in a representative selection of education systems abroad to extract any guidelines that might be applicable to South African schools. Eight education systems were surveyed: Brazil, England, Turkey, Singapore, Malaysia, China, Australia and New Zealand. The international systems surveyed in this article developed promising models, namely the National Safe Schools Framework (NSSF) in Australia, the Response Early Intervention and Assessment Community Health (REACH) programme in Singapore, the National Education Plan in the state of São Paolo, Brazil, and the two models in the category of positive disciplinary approaches in New Zealand, namely the Respectful Schools: Restorative Practices in Education and the New Zealand Minister of Education’s Positive Behaviour for [a] Learning Action Plan. A study of these international practices and underlying principles for dealing with discipline in pedagogical situations (Christian or secular) could provide guidelines for South African teachers and education authorities
Organism versus mechanism: Losing our grip on the distinction
Get PDFThe distinction between organism and mechanism is often subtle or unclear and yet can prove to be fundamental to our understanding of the world. It has been tempting for many thinkers to seek to ‘understand’ all of reality through the lens of either the one or the other of these concepts rather than by giving both a place. This article sets out to argue that there is a substantial loss of understanding when either of these metaphors is absolutised to explain all causal processes and patterns in reality. Clarifying the distinction between the two may provide one more tool to grasp what is reductionist in many of the perspectives that have come to dominate public life and science today. This contention is tested on the quest for the design of self-replicating systems (i.e. synthetic organisms) in the nanotech industry. It is common that the concepts of organic functioning and mechanism are used imprecisely and in an overlapping way. This is also true of much scientific debate, especially in the fields of biology, micro-biology and nano-science. This imprecise use signals a reductionist tendency both in the way that the organic is perceived and in terms of the distinctive nature of mechanisms
Homo ludens of homo respondens? ’n Christelikfilosofiese reaksie op ’n hedendaagse idee van die mens as primêr spelende in plaas van antwoordende wese
Get PDFHomo ludens or homo respondens? A Christian-philosophical response to a contemporary view of the human being as primarily a player instead of an answerer. In this article the contrast between a contemporary view of the human being as primarily a player (homo ludens) and the biblical view of a responding being (homo respondens) is investigated. The contribution develops as follows. The reader is first provided with an overview of the multiplicity of anthropologies developed in the course of western philosophy. This overview includes the contemporary, postmodern characterisation of the human being as structurally a homo ludens. This is, in the second place, followed by a brief exposition of how a reformational anthropology regards the human being as multidimentional and religious in nature. It therefore rejects all kinds of ‘isms’ which one-sidedly try to explain human nature from only one (or two) of its many facets, reducing all other aspects to the one absolutised. The question is then asked whether, from a Christian-philosophical perspective, a more comprehensive, directional concept should not be used to describe who a human being is. Such an embracing idea may be that humans can basically be defined as answering creatures. Matthew 11 (where the two concepts of a homo ludens and homo respondens stands in sharp contrast) serves as example of the fact that the idea of a homo respondens is employed generally in the Bible. Since this article is a tribute to Professor Ponti Venter, the concluding part indicates how also the jubilaris, approaching his seventieth birthday, in his life and publications embodied the idea of a homo respondens
Adam Smith’s contribution to secularisation
Get PDFThis article examined several crucial themes in Adam Smith’s philosophy with the purpose of highlighting and assessing his contribution to the secularisation of Western society. The article, written from the perspective of reformational philosophy, begins with a brief biography and sketch of Adam Smith’s influence on modern society, followed by a summary of Ponti Venter’s view on Smith. This sets the scene for a discussion of Adam Smith’s project, his method of tackling it, and his views on systems, philosophy of history and the concept of philosophy
Bydraende faktore tot leerderdissiplineprobleme: ’n Multiveranderlike analise
Get PDFContributory factors to learner discipline problems: A multivariate approach. Hitherto, researchers in the field of the various causal or contributory factors of learner discipline problems in schools tended to approach each of those factors in isolation. This article reported on research regarding the theoretically justifiable notion of the confluence of the various factors that culminate in learner discipline problems at school. Grade 9 learners as well as their educators completed questionnaires in which they had to indicate on a semantic differential scale the extent to which they thought each of the 36 possible causes played a role in the incidence of learner discipline problems in their school. Routine factor analysis revealed that seven factors contributed to learner misbehaviour in their particular school, namely social problems in society, the influence of parents on the behaviour of their children, the authority of the educator, democratic participation in school governance, the nature of school structures, and also physical and psychological disabilities
Teaching for a transformative engagement with our context: The importance of care in Christian pedagogical suggestions for higher education
Get PDFResponsible scholarship requires that students engage with their context and their own learning to understand and transform our world with wisdom. Ponti (J.J.) Venter argues that such a notion is central in understanding the task of a (Christian) university. In this article, dedicated to Professor Venter, I argue that the pedagogical implications of such a Christian understanding of science need to be developed further in a higher education context. I propose that care deepens wonder and sustains action by continuously calling our imagination to envisage longed-for change in both an academic and a broader social context. I offer five concrete suggestions to support lecturers in guiding students to act from their care for the world. These suggestions refer to the importance of inventory work, the cultivation of empathy, inspiring examples, emotional involvement, and an inner and outer dialogue as to the appropriate form their care should take. A Christian pedagogy should, secondly, support students in unfolding their own style of moving between theory and experience; thirdly, it should enable students to experience themselves as partners in academic discussions and as historical formative agents contributing to our world; fourthly, it should focus on a view of the world in which their tentacles are feeling for change, accompanied by normative sophistication. Fifthly, the development of a suitable pedagogy requires lecturers to develop peer groups organically to reflect on teaching practices that encourage students’ transformative engagement with our world
(Ir)rationalism: At the cross-roads of historical and systematic reflection
Get PDFThis article is dedicated to Ponti Venter for his contribution to the historical roots and systematic implications of philosophical problems. A discussion with him about four decades ago prompted me to investigate the Greek roots of our distinction of thought and being. In the analysis below, a brief sketch was given of the initial identification of thought and being in the thought of Parmenides and the consequences it had for the rationalistic tradition since the Renaissance, particularly in connection with the view that the universe itself has a rational structure. Two options were pursued in our analysis of rationalism: (1) to contrast it with empiricism and (2) to relate it to universality and the problem of what is individual. By distinguishing between conceptual and concept-transcending knowledge, an alternative systematic characterisation of rationalism (and irrationalism) is proposed, namely that it absolutises conceptual knowledge (whilst irrationalism deifies concepttranscending knowledge). This view allows for an acknowledgement of the ontic horizon of human experience, co-constituted by the dimensions of modal aspects and type laws, without elevating human understanding to become the law-giver of the world