CALL FOR PAPERS: SPECIAL ISSUE

Transitioning into calm after the COVID-19 storm: promoting holistic support to achieve positive developmental outcomes for learners in schools

Guest editors: Macalane Malindi and Johnnie Hay

South African Journal of Education Volume 43(S1), May 2023

The worldwide coronavirus disease (COVID-19) brought about changes in various aspects of life. These changes particularly affected school education in a substantial way. Schools adopted alternative methods of curriculum delivery, such as the blended approach to teaching and learning. Schools in more affluent neighbourhoods seemingly coped better with the changes, thanks to the required technology, but those in disadvantaged neighbourhoods with scarce resources were often not in a position do adapt effectively. Learners experiencing barriers to learning were even more at risk since they usually require high levels of (face-to-face) support. Initially, because of global lockdowns, movement and contact among school stakeholders were minimised. Some families also lost loved ones and some of those who passed away were parents of school-going children.

While the family is regarded as an important microsystemic stronghold for learners, so are schools and the peer group (Theron & Engelbrecht, 2012; Ungar, 2012). Access to community services is equally important in enabling learners to cope resiliently in the context of risk and adversity. The lockdowns restricted learners to their homes/immediate surroundings and allowed fewer opportunities for them to navigate their pathways towards the resources that enhance well-being - mostly located outside their households. It can be argued that this rendered these learners at risk of poor developmental outcomes since they could not fully benefit from psychosocial and psycho-educational services in their contexts as they used to.

In light of the above, we propose a special issue to attract papers that explore the impact of the pandemic on learner development and the backlogs that may consequentially have developed. Furthermore, it is important to know about the services and protective factors that learners and teachers relied on to cope resiliently.

We invite papers that document risks/challenges experienced by teachers and learners, as well as interventions that enhanced/may enhance development of psycho-social-educationally vulnerable learners.

The themes may include (but are not restricted to) schooling issues regarding the COVID-19 pandemic in relation to:

• School-going children in out-of-home contexts

• Children in special schools

• Managing learner retention and the drop-out rate

• Managing the curriculum and eliminating backlogs in learning

• Supporting bereaved and orphaned children in schools

• School management issues during and after the pandemic (mainstream schools, special schools, rural schools, and independent schools)

• Supporting holistic development (psychological, social, physical, etc.) in children

• Early childhood education - backlogs and interventions

• Supporting school-going migrant learners

• Family disruption and instability and its impact on holistic development in children

• Familial disruption and instability and its impact on resilient coping

• Teacher and learner resilience

• Teacher stress and burnout

• Inclusion and psycho-social-educational support services

References

Theron LC & Engelbrecht P 2012. Caring teachers: Teacher-youth transactions to promote resilience. In M Ungar (ed). The social ecology of resilience: A handbook of theory and practice. New York, NY: Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-0586-3        [ Links ]

Ungar M 2012. Social ecologies and their contribution to resilience. In M Ungar (ed). The social ecology of resilience: A handbook of theory and practice. New York, NY: Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-0586-3        [ Links ]

All authors interested in contributing should submit their abstracts for screening to estelle.botha@up.ac.za by 21 October 2022. Submit completed manuscripts for review to estelle.bothafgjup.ac.za.
Closing date for submissions: 15 November 2022