An overarching curriculum question is what happens to knowledge when goals are formulated in competency terms (Rasmussen et al. 2022). In contrast to many European countries, South African schools currently use a strongly framed and strongly regulated national curriculum, which is organised around subjects and not competences. The curriculum is structured around disciplinary knowledge in order to develop critical thinking and creative problem-solving skills. The official history curriculum envisages history as a process of historical enquiry. The focus is on what learners can do with their historical knowledge and not only on recalling the knowledge (Bertram, 2020).   The history curriculum aims to create: an interest and enjoyment in the study of the past; knowledge, understanding and appreciation of the past; the ability to undertake a process of historical enquiry based on skills and understanding of historical concepts, including historical sources and evidence (DBE, 2011, p. x).  The practice of historical enquiry is a complex competence which requires deep substantive history knowledge, good understanding of language and an understanding of the purpose of the task.

The study aimed to understand how 12 history teachers in eight high schools enact the national history curriculum and how their pedagogy illustrates the practice of historical enquiry. While the bigger study aimed to understand pedagogic evaluation within high school history, mathematics, English and mathematical literacy classrooms, this paper focuses only on the data from history classrooms.

The objective of the study is to understand how the official history curriculum is enacted in selected Grade 8 and grade 10 classrooms with a broad focus on how pedagogic evaluation reveals what criteria are legitimated, particularly regarding the practice of historical enquiry.

The broad framing concept of the study is pedagogic evaluation. According to Bernstein (2000, p. 50), “the key to pedagogic practice is continuous evaluation”. Thus, evaluation marks out criteria for the recognition and realisation of legitimate knowledge statements (Bernstein, 2000) and is central to the reproduction of knowledge in pedagogic contexts. We have to bear in mind that legitimate does not necessarily mean correct from the point of view of the subject or discipline. Pedagogic evaluation is broader than tasks that assess learners’ knowledge and encompasses all forms of pedagogic communication such as teacher and learner talk or written productions, textbooks and other curriculum resources, tests and examinations.

Black and Wiliam (2009) conceptualise formative assessment as an aspect that is inherent in the whole of classroom practice, not a separate activity. It is similar to Bernstein’s notion of pedagogy as constant evaluation. The study focuses on the evaluative activity of the teacher and how the teacher makes criteria explicit through explanations and feedback on learner productions.

William and Thompson (2008) provide a framework to structure the analysis of formative assessment carried out in classrooms. The overarching idea of their framework is the use of evidence of student learning to adjust instruction to better meet the identified student learning needs.

Drawing on the above, we developed a theoretical framework and classroom observation tool for investigating pedagogic evaluation that focused on three key aspects of teachers’ practice, namely: Articulating purpose and explaining content; Checking learners’ understanding through questions and tasks; and Teachers’ feedback to learner productions. The research question for this paper is:

• How does pedagogic evaluation illustrate what is legitimated in selected history classrooms, and how do teachers enact historical enquiry? 

The project collected data in eight case study high schools in two South African provinces, the Western Cape and Eastern Cape. These two provinces represent distinct socio-economic, historical, and educational contexts. Eastern Cape is one of the poorest provinces in South Africa with high levels of unemployment, rural poverty, and limited infrastructure. The Western Cape in contrast, is more urbanized, has better infrastructure, higher income levels and generally higher educational outcomes. Educational policy in general, and curriculum and assessment policy in particular, is developed at a national level. It is instructive to research how policies are implemented in these diverse contexts. Comparing the provinces provides valuable lessons for understanding the complexities of educational inequality and for considering policy options that can improve the quality of education across the country. The study focused on the Grade 8 and Grade 10 levels in Mathematics, Mathematical Literacy, English (First Additional Language and Home Language) and History. In each of the eight schools, seven teachers were observed across two consecutive lessons and were interviewed. 54 teachers were interviewed and classroom video data from 99 lessons was collected. One researcher accompanied by a trained fieldworker observed classroom pedagogy across two consecutive lessons, collecting video and audio-recorded data and producing a detailed, written description of both lessons. After each lesson, the data collectors completed a closed-ended observation tool that was designed to measure scaled levels of pedagogic evaluation in the lesson observed. In this way, the completion of the tool was made in reference to detailed narrative accounts and subjected to a form of inter-rater reliability at the point of data collection. The video and audio-recorded data also allowed for later, in-depth analysis, and provided an alternative opportunity for coding where both data collectors could not be present in the same lesson. This presentation focuses on the history data collected from a total of seven Grade 8 teachers (13 lessons) and five grade 10 teachers (10 lessons).

Analysis of the history classroom video recordings show that overall, teachers provided clear and accurate explanations of content. However, levels of questioning were generally quite low. In some instances, when teachers do ask high-level questions, there is no response from learners. Very few lessons show any kind of discussion or dialogue. In only two classes do the learners ask any questions which indicate some engagement on the topic. Thus, the enacted curriculum does not reflect the vision of the official curriculum that learners ‘participate in constructive debate and engage critically with issues’. The third focus on feedback and elaboration on the learners’ responses also shows variation across the 23 lessons. In 4 lessons, the teacher always elaborates on why student responses are correct or incorrect; in 5 lessons, this was never the case. Detailed exemplars will be provided to illustrate the various ways in which teachers asked questions and provided elaborations and feedback and how they worked with historical enquiry. Most of the observed classrooms did not reflect historical enquiry as envisaged by the official curriculum. While there was often a focus on source-based tasks, learners engaged with these in procedural and technical, rather than meaningful ways. This seems similar to a study in France that showed teachers breaking complex competencies into simplistic, procedural competencies to aid struggling pupils. The practice is enacted in ways that strip it of its intention, so that it becomes a technical exercise (Anderson-Levitt, 2021).

Anderson-Levitt, K. (2021) Competence-based reforms and disciplinary content: Some lessons from Europe and the Americas Bernstein, B. (2000) Pedagogy, symbolic control and identity. Theory, research, critique. Revised ed. . Rowman & Littlefield. Bertram, C. (2020). Remaking history: The pedagogic device and shifting discourses in the South African school history curriculum. Yesterday & Today, 23, 1-29. https://doi.org/http://dx.doi.org/10.17159/2223-0386/2020/n23a1 Black, P., & William, D. (2009). Developing the Theory of Formative Assessment. Educational Assessment, Evaluation and Accountability, 21, 5-31. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11092-008-9068-5 Department of Basic Education. (2011). Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement Grades 10-12, History. Pretoria: Department of Basic Education Rasmussen, J., Rasch-Christensen, A., & Qvortrup, L. (2022). Knowledge or competencies? A controversial question in contemporary curriculum debates. European Educational Research Journal, 21(6), 1009-1022. https://doi.org/10.1177/14749041211023338 Wiliam, D., & Thompson, M. (2008). Integrating assessment with instruction: What will it take to make it work? In C. A. Dwyer (Ed.), The future of assessment: Shaping teaching and learning (pp. 53–82).: LawrenceErlbaum Associates.