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Post Graduate Certificate in Education (South African Sign Language)

The Post-Graduate Certificate in Education South African Sign Language (SASL) course aims to prepare you in a practical way for teaching SASL at a South African School for the Deaf in the FET Phase. It will focus specifically on your knowledge of theory and method on which to base your teaching and will include topics selected from the following: Understanding the new SASL CAPS, methods of teaching language and literature (with specific focus of SASL), materials and resource development, lesson planning and assessment. PGCE SASL consists of GET (EDUC5163A) and/FET (EDUC5212A) courses.

A key outcome of the course is to prepare you as fully as possible to teach SASL – language and literature in an imaginative, challenging, integrated and critical way at Home Language level by following CAPS SASL curriculum.

Effective teaching of South African Sign Language (SASL) as a first language requires your competence in four areas:

  • Subject (content) knowledge: a comprehensive knowledge of South African Sign Language (SASL) as a language in its own right.
  • Knowledge of Deaf learners and their world: (Deaf epistemologies) knowledge of Deaf learners’ experiences in everyday life, of the difficulties/barriers they experience, of their learning experiences and preferences and their identities within the Deaf Community and Culture.
  • Teaching methodology (pedagogy): knowledge of, and insight into the different methods of and approaches to teaching and assessment of Deaf learners.
  • Pedagogical content knowledge (PCK): the ability to select and use appropriate teaching strategies and materials to enable learners to understand the concepts and processes in the SASL curriculum and use these concepts and processes in their everyday life. 

This course assumes your competence in subject knowledge since you are a South African Sign Language graduate. It focuses on how, through different teaching strategies, you can help learners to construct their knowledge of SASL as their 1st language and how you can help learners to explore their own identity and culture through their 1st language. A second but just as important outcome which the SASL CAPS will facilitate is the development of a bilingual identity and literacy within the 2nd language, namely English. 

Lecture times:

  • EDUC5163A GET: Tuesdays: 08:00 - 10:00
  • EDUC5212A FET: Wednesdays 2-4 pm and Fridays 8-10am

Enquiries:

For Admission requirements and information, see PGCE website: /education/academic-programmes/postgraduate-certificate-in-education-pgce/ or the PGCE brochure.

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