Comment 3
She was too friendly with the class and did not control the noise. Those
students who were trying to focus were distracted by others and she did not
seem to be bothered by this. After about ten minutes of sitting in the front of
the room, she stood up and walked around explaining things in English and
in one group used Fijian. This took about 10 minutes and then she left the
class to see to her cleaning duties supervision. The class continued working
unsupervised on the activities given and some seemed to be doing their
homework in other subjects. When she got back, she asked them if they had
coped with the unit tasks and they all said yes. She seemed pleased and then
went over the homework activity.It was clear from the observations that the prescribed theoretical approach
of constructivism has been ingrained in all of the observed teachers’ minds.
As a result, they all said that they applied constructivist teaching approaches,
but it was clear from observations that applied pedagogical knowledge and
skills are lacking. What transpired in the classrooms could only be described
as very much the conventional transmission approach, with an emphasis
on increased student activities. What emerges is the need for review of the
coverage and treatment of pedagogical approaches in teacher education
programmes and in ongoing professional development. These will need to
be constructively aligned to ensure that teachers have a firm understanding
of the relationship between their ‘pedagogical choices and student learning
outcomes’ (Kalantzis and Cope, 2010, p. 200).
An added problematic in the pedagogical understanding to action discourse
was raised by Richardson (2003) who notes that the learning theories that
inform teaching should be examined carefully. She also questions the
dynamics of constructivist teaching, and moves beyond just linking new
content to prior content knowledge. This raises the issue of ‘how students
learn best’ in context. The question that then emerges in Fiji relates to the
diversity of student learning styles in the Fijian classroom. This is an area that
has been neglected in educational research in Fiji and, given the multicultural
composition of Fijian students, is an area in need of investigation.
In light of this, it is troubling that most teachers surveyed in this study do
not feel that context is critical to effective pedagogical practice. Less than
half of both teacher samples agreed that the Fijian school context presents
specific pedagogical issues that need to be addressed: 40 per cent of primary