Thinker Spot

Following the developments of Education in South Africa Education in South Africa - Info SA I am fortunate enough to be part of a new development in tertiary education. Efforts to establish a new university in Mpumalanga has brought together a number of roleplayers and stakeholders which has resulted in the launch of the Teacher Education Campus in Marble Hall. The University of Johannesburg provides the academic program -- one that is unique in the sense that it involves a teaching school. Initially introduced at the Soweto Campus, this approach to Teacher Training proves to be successful. Similar in principal to an academic hospital for trainee doctors, the teaching school offers teachers-to-be the opportunity to observe a fully functional, real-world school. The establishment of a new university in the Mpumalanga province is an opportunity to be based in a rural part of South Africa. The aim with this multi-stakeholder initiative is to train students from rural areas in ...

The yellow piece of paper with its big fat black letters printed in bold is neatly laminated. Stuck on the side of the classroom cupboard it is meant to be seen as students walk into the class. But they barely do, since they are too busy with their own lives. The yellow poster proclaims our current president's words: "Children should be in class, on time, learning, being respectful of their teachers and each other, and DO THEIR HOMEWORK" - President Jacob Zuma (7 August 2009) Hmmm... sounds like presidential support for what teachers are trying to achieve day in and day out, lesson after lesson... Alas, with little success it seems. My Grade 11s wrote a cycle test three days ago. Yesterday I started marking. The first paper I opened screamed at me! The student wrote "useless dupless" all over the question paper. I could not help but take it personally.  The president's words brought some relief. Or did it really? Indeed, can it? The president is far-remo...

With the amount of work to be completed by the end of term heaping up like a mountain it seems impossible to accomplish. 'A bridge too far', 'A mountain too high'... Given the fact that I am a student too, it means that my term as teacher more or less coincides with my term as student. Assessment, marking, writing exams, marking others' cycle tests, and so forth... Im sure you get the picture. ... and then there is the prospect of new plans... new challenges for the year ahead -- all in the name of reviving school-based education. It was particularly apt then that I started to look for inspiration. It takes a lot of energy and will power to mark a stack of papers... all while I am thinking of my own examination that is looming. It takes even more guts and raw courage to put a bold plan on the table in the hope that management will accept it as a way to move forward. See, I have a deep-seated belief that education -- throughout the whole spectrum in South Africa --...

During the past week or so I have become acutely aware of the lack of a culture of learning amongst some of the pupils I teach. Still continuing with my journey of discovery into the state of Government-school education in an urban school in Johannesburg (South Africa), I am completely taken aback by the range of excuses I must listen to: My textbook is too heavy and I don't want to carry it around the whole day I don't have my books here today Why must I take my bag off my table or open any books? Sir, the exercise you have given us to complete for marks is unfair. Why must I now learn MovieMaker? I thought we will only write a cycle test and a class test. This is really unfair. (This is so strange, considering Sir Ken Robinson's views that schools are killing creativity.) and so the list goes on... (I feel compelled to have video cameras installed in my classroom since this is the kind of footage that parents need to see). I think, once I have collected enough ev...

We all know the story of the guy who, in an effort to save them, was walking on the beach and kept on throwing back sea stars that washed ashore. On seeing how many there were, a passer-by commented on the 'lost effort', upon which the guy answered that 'even saving one' would made a difference, even then if only to that 'one that was saved'... And so my quest to experience secondary education 'first-hand' carries on at an urban school in Johannesburg, South Africa. The profile of learners vary, with a predominant number of them being black -- other races are well represented too. What this means is that in a decade's time a predominant 'white' school has become a 'predominant black school'. This in itself merely reflects the changes currently taking place within South Africa itself -- a school being a mirror of what's happening in the communities it serves. The racial shift is accompanied by a class-shift as well, as economic p...

My journey to (re)discover what is currently the state of secondary education in a typical urban school in the Johannesburg area has surely started off with a rude awakening. A week into the third term and I am left with enough proof of a number of things that are completely out of place. Although the new ANC-led government has since it came into power in 1994 failed to transform education (amongst an array of other failures, especially broad-based service delivery), we are faced with another reality: in a growing economy with wide-spread unemployment, the disconnect between what the workforce has to offer and what the market requires obviously starts at secondary education level. The ANC-government's inadequacies surely amplify many of the structural problems with the educational system. However, the very model which they try to perfect is a completely outdated one. The government prior to 1994, and surely the one after 1994 failed to redefine the educational system in the wak...

Having spent most of my career in educational environments fulfilling various roles, a year and a half at the Innovation Agency inspired me to get back into the game. Being away from an educational environment has surely given me some food for thought. The invaluable lessons I have learned while at the Innovation Agency have equipped me to look for opportunities in education... and to be an active innovator! Innovation in education... an interesting concept indeed, and one that often focuses on technology. In fact, educational technology is often on agendas around the world -- also in South Africa. Linked to innovation, it was a topic of discussion at an event organised by SAINE and hosted at Gijima on 26 July 2012. Under discussion was the Action Plan for 2025 , aimed at realising education in 2025. Like other countries, considerable attention is given to education. This is especially true in the South African educational system, since we expected so much from our educational sys...

History as a stystem -- there's an interesting concept... History coming alive through technology Travel across the Roman Empire in real time with ORBIS | Ars Technica

This is surely worth a try... Data visualisation made as easy as child's play... so, lets try it out... Infographics' Data Visualizations | Visual.ly

And the convergence of all the media channels are continuing... this time from Google+ Hangouts... Maybe I must consider a Hangout for the planned Workshop at Innovation Agency.... there's an Idea... Surely this opens up all kinds of possiblities, especially for businesses relying on Social Media to get the message out... and of course journalists. How Google + is changing news; a powerful tool for immediate stories « Social Wisdom: Digital Strategy Musings

The academic findings of those working with Social networks in organisations are all bearing fruit... the insights we start to derive from studying organisational networks are phenomenal... Yet, managers must learn to use SNA and the many measures that interpret sociograms / social maps, and social network analysis reports. Based on these findings teams can for example become more effective, or in the wake of organisational lay-offs, what-if analysis can be done beforehand to understand how relationships will be affected. Fractured networks more than the actual talent leaving have a far greater negative impact on productivity... something Im set to prove empiracally. The hidden workplace: What's your OQ? - July 23, 2007

Cloud computing taken to a whole new level... but what intrigues me are the possibilities for collaboration with others inside and outside the organisation... Can employees ANY longer afford to work in isolation? Can any organisation carry on working they way they have? Can managers even consider NOT paying attention to these developments? Organisational IT departments and the CIO and CTO surely have to sit up and take notice... Google Enterprise - Google+

Collaborative Consumerism A truly great idea with many examples, high- and low tech... however, poor communities or resource-challenged ones like those found in Africa all offer outstanding examples of how people have always been sharing and co-operating in order to survive. I wonder if its just a case of (spoilt, wealthy) Westerners also waking up to the idea of sharing resources and using it more optimally. And now we have a found a word for it: Collaborative Consumerism. Living in South Africa and travelling through the city center of Johannesburg offer countless examples of people making a living by sharing what little they have. South Africa's so-called 'Black taxis' industry is a great example of a system that works... for those who understand and rely on it... of course... and it works because of sharing routes, co-operating, etc -- all within a framework that the industry created for itself... (Simplistic view... granted) Perhaps US citizens will recall how A...

Mountains outside Newcastle, KwaZulu-Natal In the 1800s this mountain, just outside Newcastle towards the west of the town, was the main route to the Free State -- Bloemfontein -- to be specific. This area in northern KwaZulu Natal was also the scene of clashes between Boers and the British when the latter was in the process to colonise the whole of South Africa. Newcastle was a connector town -- some 200 km towards the North in the Amajuba mountains that during the so-called First Anglo War was the scene of heavy battles between the Boers and British -- the British lost this round but a few years later they were back -- learned more about the South African environment and adapated their tactics to face their biggest foe: the Boers. By 1899 the Anglo Boer War broke out between the Boers and the British. It lasted until 1902 when the Boers were defeated. A well-equipped British army and other tacticts such as a scorched earth policy left the Boers with few alternatives. Above ...

What an awe-inspiring building this is, enriching the Johannesburg skyline... Alas, the Johannesburg Stock Exchange that use to operate from this location in 17 Diagonal Street, Newtown moved to Gwen ln, Sandton. The Newtown area in and around where the old JSE use to be has been earmarked for further development. One of the the developments that has been completed is the Nelson Mandela bridge. The rest of the developments seems to be on ice. But will it become a reality or remain drawings? Im not sure at this point. The Nelson Mandela bridge connects downtown Johannesburg with Braamfontein where another landmark is situated, the University of the Witwatersrand. This bridge eases congestion between the Johannesburg CBD and the suburbs to its north that get connected via Braamfontein. However, its the symbolism of naming the bridge after the country's most iconic bridge builder, Nelson Mandela, that captures one's imagination. The old Tramshed building borders the Ne...

So, around every corner we find a Coke sign... a welcoming sign that tells us something that resembles civilisation is around. This picture was taken while sitting in traffic in Hillbrow -- a notorious, densely populated urban spot in Johannesburg, South Africa. In South Africa's so-called struggle history Coca-Cola played its part in breaking down barriers -- as far as I could gather it promoted opressed black people into management positions long before it became fashionable... and before it was actually legal under Apartheid legislation to have black people in certain jobs. So, playing on the idea that Coke can be associated with the most memorable moments in anybody's life, I guess it also goes for us during our country's darkest moment.

Downtown Johannesburg is starting to look like a war-zone -- this building has become unusable -- every single window is covered with cardboard and plastic bags to cover it up. Like other buildings near this one, decay has been allowed to set in. Like car jackings in other countries, in South Africa, specifically Johannesburg in Gauteng Province corruption has set into the property sector. It works like this: All the paperwork that accompanies property owenership gets falsified and enters the system... the lawful owners finally have to defend or try and proof that they are the lawful owners... I have in my whole life never thought that it is possible to steal a building... The local govenment, led by the ANC party that also governs the national government is helpless in the face of these and other forms of corruption. But enough about politics and corrupt officials or dysfunctional systems... Buildings are living spaces and reflect something about society -- hinting at a past era -- o...

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