Pre-Service Teachers' Views on The Performing Arts, Based on Their Theatre-In-Education Production.

Overview & Synopsis

Many lecturers involved in teacher education modules in SouthAfrica tend to follow lecturer-centred approaches when teaching the subjectcontent knowledge, which inhibits learning. Hence this study aimed toexplore how second year Intermediate Phase pre-service teachers (grades 4-6), attending an English language methodology module (PIME 303),experienced the application of the performing arts to engage with the text‘Whitney’s Kiss’ by Ohne Vegter, which is a prescribed text for theintermediate phase in South African schools. The class consisted of 40Intermediate Phase pre-service teachers, none of whom had any priorexposure to the performing arts. The research methodology was qualitative,and the design was phenomenological. Data comprised written reflectionsafter the production, which were coded and analysed thematically. Some ofthe themes emerging from the study indicate that the application ofperforming arts-based approaches within higher education classes have thepotential to develop pre-service teachers’ creativity, confidence, ability towork as a team and to reflect on how such approaches could be applied withinthe context of their own school- based learning contexts.