Science Teachers’ Views and Applications of Technology-Based Teaching

Abstract

This paper investigates the following research questions: i) What are South African Further Education and Training physical science teachers’ views about the use of WhatsApp, Facebook, and YouTube in the classroom? and ii) How do they use these Web 2.0 applications in the delivery of their lessons? Phenomenology was used as a research paradigm, and one-on-one, semi-structured interviews were the main sources of data collection to elicit rich descriptions of the teachers’ views and experiences with Web 2.0 applications. Ten purposively selected teachers from two different provinces in South Africa participated in the study. All the teachers had more than fifteen years of teaching experience and taught in science-focused schools or technical high schools in the FET band. The findings show that, despite a lack of training and support from the local district offices, 7 of the 10 respondents had a positive disposition and epistemic openness toward WhatsApp, 1 of 10 responded positively to the use of Facebook, and all participants found YouTube to be an effective tool for lesson preparation. The findings have implications for teacher educators, and professional development programs are required to prepare and assist in-service and pre-service teachers with the dissemination of content in a technological, pedagogical space.