Research study sample

The overall selection of the participating schools was done by the Chair, with advice from the district office. The selection criteria were that schools should be identified as ‘functional’ (which loosely implied schools with a timetable that had a maths slot in which classes were held during school time) (Graven, 2011a). Additionally schools or a significant portion of

learners in schools should be from previously disadvantaged backgrounds. These criteria are laid down by funders. Following a meeting with Principals on the 10th of February 2011, and visits to schools by the Chair, volunteering grade 3 and 4 (Foundation and Intermediate phase) teachers were invited to participate in NICLE’s professional development exercise. By the second NICLE seminar 15 schools and 57 educators attended and committed themselves to regular participation in NICLE (SANC, 2011; Graven, 2011b). The four clusters of the NICLE participating schools are:

Grahamstown: urban/town area Alexandria: small coastal town

Kenton (and Bathurst): coastal town and commercial farming area Alicedale: small rural residential town

The use of criteria to identify the participating primary schools and teachers is characteristic of the purposive sampling strategy.

Within this sample of invited and willing teachers I used a combination of purposive and stratified sampling strategies to select 10 primary maths teachers who were part of this study. Two of these teachers withdrew from NICLE after 2011; Brenda transferred from Martindale to another farm school and could no longer attend NICLE, whilst Swallow only sporadically attended the NICLE 2012 sessions, citing increased administrative responsibilities. I did not have full data sets for these two teachers, and I thus chose to exclude them from the final study sample analysed here. I intentionally selected teachers who actively participated and frequently attended NICLE sessions and additionally those teachers who were willing to be part of this longitudinal research study. I thus purposively sampled the 8 teachers who form part of this study (McMillian & Schumacher, 2001). In my quest to have a relatively representative sample of the general population of primary maths teachers in South Africa, I used the stratified sampling method (Neuman, 2009). In this respect teachers in the sample are from four different types or categorisations of schools in the South African education system. Two are from a Farm school, called Martindale Primary, which has multi-grade classes; two are from an African township school – Bongani Primary; two are from historically coloured schools (Delta Primary and Delta Combined School) in a historically

coloured area, and two are from an ex model C29 preparatory school, Heritage, in a formerly white area. From each school type I purposively selected the sampled 8 primary teachers. Whilst Heritage Preparatory is located in the Grahamstown urban area, Bongani Primary, Delta Primary and Delta High School are in a coastal village in the Alexandria cluster, which is 85 kilometres from Grahamstown, with Martindale located 80 kilometres from Grahamstown in a farming area in the Bathurst/Kenton district. All School and teacher names are pseudonyms.

I also chose my sample to be representative of a range of grades across NICLE teachers. In this sample therefore there are Grade R teachers, Grade 1 to 3 FP teachers, multigrade teachers and IP teachers. In this purposively-stratified sample of teachers, two are intermediate phase male teachers, (Calvin and Robert), with the former only teaching Grades 5 and 6 maths classes at his school at which he is the deputy principal, whilst the latter teaches Grade 4 to 7 mathematics, Grade 6 and 7 technology and grade 7 English. One of the participants is an all-subjects multi-grade teacher of grades 4-5 (Everton). Of the five FP teachers, two are Grade R teachers (Mary and Edna) with the other three teachers teaching Grade 3 classes (Ruth, Melania & Pamela). Notably all the foundation phase teachers in the sample are female. This is also the case for the larger group of NICLE teachers - that is, all Foundation Phase teachers in NICLE are female, while there are 5 male NICLE teachers, all of whom teach in the Intermediate Phase. For this reason my sample has more female than male teachers.

The sampled teachers were invited to participate in my research, after I explained that participation was voluntary and could be terminated at any time. I also explained the nature of my research and what would be involved. The letter inviting the sampled teachers to voluntarily participate in this research is included in Appendix 2. The table below provides background information on the teachers, as captured at the end of 2012. Pseudonyms have been used.

School Name & Type Teacher Pseudonym Gender/ Age range Phase/Grade (subject/s) taught & School position Teaching years experience Qualifications Martindale - Farm

school with some multigrade classes

Everton F/51-60 I P – 4 & 5 16 B. Ed. (Secondary) Mary* F/31-40 F P - 0 6 Matric

Final Year - National Primary Diploma in Education

Heritage - Preparatory

public school (Ex- model C) in a historically white middle

class suburb

Ruth F/51-60 F P - 3 27 B. Ed. (Honours)

Melania F/41-50 F P -3 11 Higher Diploma in

Education Bongani - Historically African school in a historically black township Calvin M/41-50 I P – 5 & 6 (maths) Deputy Principal 25 B. Ed. Maths

Pamela F/41-50 F P - 3 17 Further Diploma in Education Delta High - Historically coloured Combined school in a historically coloured area Edna F/31-40 F P - 0 6 Matric

Final Year - National Primary Diploma in Education Delta Primary - Historically coloured primary school in a historically coloured area Robert M/41-50 IP – 4-7 (Maths), 6-7 (technology), 7 (English) 19 B.Ed. Honours in Maths Education Currently studying for a Masters in Maths Education Table 5.1: Sample Teachers’ background information

*Mary transferred at the beginning of the third term in July 2012 from Martindale to Port Albert School, which is a former model C combined school and continued to teach a Grade R class.

The range and diversity of the sampled teacher group assists in providing breadth to exploring the processes through which primary maths teacher identities evolve in relation to the grade(s) taught or phase specialisation, thus helping to illuminate the first research question.

5.5 Data Collection Methods