Elaine Browne.pdf - Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University

the curriculum did not provide sufficient guidance regarding the ‘how’ of teaching Arts and
Culture. One teacher expressed himself as follows: “There is no formula that says you must do
this or do that. With the visual art there is no structure that you must follow this pattern”.
According to another teacher, “the Department has all the knowledge but they don’t know how
it is done. There’s not a good theory where Arts and Culture is concerned”. On the whole, the
teachers felt destitute as a result of the curriculum’s ‘descriptive’ nature. They lacked guidance
regarding the ‘how’ of implementation. One respondent (a second‐language speaker) felt that,
“If the Department of Education can supply us with enough resources it will be even better and
each and every learning step of Arts and Culture must be fabricated so that we can understand
what is saying then”. Another teacher was very clear about a possible solution: “There must be
recommended books, we must just use one book, one book for everybody”.
Sub‐theme 1.4: The multicultural nature of the curriculum
The South African teacher population represents many different cultures and amongst the
teachers being interviewed were Black, Coloured, White and Indian teachers. It became clear
that the respondents found it very difficult to learn or to teach a song or dance from a culture
other than their own. A Xhosa teacher explained that the Western culture dominated at in‐
service training workshops. She is unfamiliar with songs used in demonstrations, like Baba Black
Sheep. She furthermore mentioned that the music, as stipulated in the Arts and Culture
Learning Area Statement was not true to her own culture as it was too Western orientated. In
response, another Xhosa teacher confessed her unfamiliarity with traditional Xhosa dances, as
she did not grow up in the rural areas. She emphasised: “If someone comes with doing that, we
57