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Item Investigating relationship between Accounting students’ learning style preferences and their academic performance at a University of Technology in South Africa(Taylor and Fancis Online, 2017-10-11) Cekiso, Madoda; Arends, Jeffery; Mkabile, Bulelwa; Meyiwa, ThenjiweThe purpose of this study was to explore the association between accounting students’ learning style preferences and their academic performance at an institution of higher learning in South Africa. Kolb’s Learning Style Inventory (LSI) was used to identify the learning style preferences of the first, second and third year accounting students. The students’ academic performance for accounting was based on the scores obtained in the final examination assessment component. A purposeful sample of first, second and third year students registered for a Bachelor of Education degree were used in this study. The findings indicated that the majority of the first-year students were the convergers whereas the results for the second and third year students revealed that the majority were divergers. The results further revealed that the relationship between first year students’ learning styles and academic performance was significant whereas there was no significant relationship between second and third year students’ learning styles and their academic performance.Item Complex journeys and methodological responses to engaging in self-study in a rural comprehensive university(University of the Free State, 2014) Meyiwa, Thenjiwe; Chisanga, T.; Mokhele, Paul; Sotshangane, Nkonsinathi; Makhanya, SizakeleThe context in which self-study research is conducted is sometimes complex, affecting the manner in which related data is gathered and interpreted. This article comprises collaboration between three students and two supervisors. It shares methodological choices made by graduate students and supervisors of a rural university at which, self-study research was introduced in 2010. As individuals, and as a collective, we reflect on the reasons and decisions for adopting certain research approaches towards self-study: the ways in which such decisions are negotiated in conceptualising, conducting, transcribing, and supervising graduate research. While self-reflexive data-collection approaches (mainly journal writing and storytelling) guide our research, the manner in which data is analysed and presented to the wider university community is influenced by expectations and by the context of the university. We, therefore, use innovative approaches differing from self-study research, speaking more to the challenges and expectations of a rural context. We further reflect on the implications such choices have for our research and the work produced – where knowledge shifts are executed, methodologies are re-defined and social change is desired.Item Women in selected rural municipalities: Resilience and agency against vulnerabilities to climate change(Taylor and Francis, 2014-11-03) Meyiwa, Thenjiwe; Maseti, Thandokazi; Ngubane, Sizani; Letsekha, Tebello; Rozani, CarinaThe role of rural women in eradicating poverty and ending hunger has been recognised by both scholars and practitioners. There is an acknowledgement that women serve a critical role in the agricultural labour force, subsistence farming, and rural development in sub-Saharan Africa, yet their central role in food security has been largely ignored, particularly in policy (Govender, 2012). Although much of the labour of rural women is not nationally defined as economically active employment these women still spend long hours in undervalued productive and reproductive work to ensure the well-being of their households. Linked to this role is the challenge of dealing with rapidly changing climatic conditions. Women assume primary responsibility in fetching water and wood for meal preparation, and in tilling the ground. They are among the most vulnerable groups to climate change as a result of their precarious environmental livelihoods. Using data from a workshop with rural women to discuss climate change and qualitative interviews with rural women in selected rural communities in the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal we explore the meaning of climate change. We report on the way climate change is understood, its effects on rural livelihoods and some responses to climate change problems experienced by the women in the communities. The women in the rural communities highlight that there are also social problems that have arisen from water scarcity. As a result of the household division of labour, rural girls confront particular challenges as they need to search further from home for water and are exposed to the risk of gender violence.Item Gendered naming and values attached to amaXhosa Amakrwala (Graduate-initiates)(Kamla-Raj, 2014) Meyiwa, Thenjiwe; Cekiso, MadodaThis paper is based on a study that explored the gendered naming and values attached to the amaXhosa amakrwala, and the kind of behaviour expected from them after being ‘declared men’. Drawing from an empirical study that sought to understand the conceptual underpinnings of the practice, the paper presents the perceptual voices of both the graduate initiates and name-givers. The study was qualitative in nature and the participants were selected purposefully. Interviews of 40-50 minutes were conducted in the isiXhosa language which was the mother tongue of the respondents. The data was collected from10 graduate-initiates, 4 male name-givers and 2 female name-givers. The results revealed that the names given to amaXhosa graduate-initiates reflected social identity, values and social expectations.Item ‘Walking our talk’ : exploring supervision of postgraduate self-study research through metaphor drawing(Unisa Press, 2014) Pithouse-Morgan, K.; Chisanga, T.; Meyiwa, Thenjiwe; Muthukrishna, N.; Naicker, I.; Singh, L.; Van Laren, L.; Harrison, LizThe authors of this article portray their learning as a group of eight academics who met to examine the roles and relationships of supervisors of postgraduate self-study research. In the article, they represent how through a metaphor-drawing activity they were able collectively to rethink their experiences and understandings of becoming and being supervisors of postgraduate self-study students. They used a metaphor-drawing activity to gain further understanding of self-study supervision, while also learning more about how visual methods can assist in self-study research. Significantly, in their drawings the supervisor was portrayed as a partner working with the student during the supervision process, rather than as a provider of expert knowledge. Through collaborative interactions and sharing of their personal images of supervision of postgraduate self-study research with critical friends, they were able to reconsider their practices in a reflexive manner that provided insight into possibilities for enhancing their supervisory roles and relationships.Item Learning from the first year of the Transformative Education/al Studies (TES) project(2012) Harrison, Liz; Pithouse-Morgan, Kathleen; Conolly, Joan Lucy; Meyiwa, ThenjiweThe Transformative Education/al Studies project (TES) is a three-year, funded project led by researchers from three universities: a University of Technology, a Research-Intensive university, and a rural Comprehensive University. The project participants are academic staff members who are pursuing Masters and Doctoral studies and their supervisors. These participants, all engaged in self-study of their practice in Higher Education, form an inter-institutional, trans-disciplinary learning community. TES aims to enhance and study the development of self-reflexive pedagogic, research and supervision capacity among these participants. In this article, we make public our learning thus far about supporting an emerging postgraduate research learning community involving academic staff working and studying in three very different university contexts. The data sources comprise digital logbooks kept by participants, workshop evaluations, and the researchers‟ personal reflections and communications. Our analysis contributes to a body of academic work that explores how collaborative and social approaches to scholarship can enhance research capacity, productivity and quality in Higher Education. The conceptual underpinning of the article is that of reflexive ubuntu, which demands a consciousness of our developing „selves‟ as researchers and supervisors and of our interrelationships with other people.