| Summary: | The education reform of the South African democratically elected government
ushered in the further education and training (FET) curriculum policy guided by strategic
principles and values. This study identified and analysed the principles and values
guiding the FET curriculum policy in relation to the factors leading to their selection and
the effect of such choices on the FET curriculum design.
A tri-dimensional method of Critical Discourse Analysis as developed by Fairclough
(1995) was employed and supplemented with a method of curriculum analysis as
developed by Jansen and Reddy (1994) for the analysis of the principles and values.
Investigation into the National Curriculum Statement for FET (General) (2003) revealed
that the principles and values fall into two categories: Economic based and social-related
principles, both aiming to achieve social transformation.
This dissertation positions education and training curriculum design within an
emancipatory praxis approach as developed by Grundy (1987), and argued that since the
gain in learning principles and values is that which leads to the development and
refinement of the individual, the social-related principles and values should be taught
holistically as a subject. I contend that the ‘discrete’ integration and application of socialrelated
principles and values in subject statements will not provide an effective way of
assessing the competences of such learning. This is because ‘discrete’ means subtle and
subtle is elusive – ungraspable. I therefore argue that if the leaders of tomorrow who are
the learners of today are expected to project and defend the principles values that the
South African society is built on, it is imperative that these learners learn them holistically. Finally, an individual is assessed by what he /she thinks says, and does and the hands
are one of the vehicles that carries out the command of the head, if the hands fail to
respond to the ‘will’ of the head, that ‘will’ becomes of no effect. In the light of this
argument, I contend that practical work without cognitive knowledge is no knowledge
just as cognitive knowledge without practical application is absolutely no knowledge. === Thesis (M.Ed.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2009.
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