http://41.74.91.244:8080/handle/123456789/42 2026-04-04T10:38:49Z http://41.74.91.244:8080/handle/123456789/4627 Academic Leadership Journal Developing Critical Thinking Skills of Pre-service Teachers in Ghana: Teaching Methods and Classroom Ecology Owu-Ewie, C. According to Beyer (1997), the most important goal of schooling is learning and learning is a consequence of thinking. Students’ success in school is heavily dependent on their inclination as well as their ability to think skillfully. Promoting critical thinking skills in learners has attracted the attention of educators but little consideration is given to how teachers should be trained to promote it in schools. Educational planners, especially in African countries including Ghana have given little thought to how teacher training institutions should prepare pre-service teachers to enhance students’ critical thinking skills (Acheampong, 2001; Hill, 2000). Improving the quality of students’ thinking in schools requires skillful teaching. Such a skill does not emerge without preparation. The challenge to pre-service teacher institutions in Ghana therefore, is to pursue training programs that prepare pre-service teachers to develop their students’ critical thinking skills. Pre-service teachers need to be prepared to teach their students to think critically but teacher preparation in Ghana is devoid of the application of activities or strategies that develop the thinking skills of student-teachers (Ghana Education service/Teacher Education Division/Overseas Development Agency, 1993). Though there has been a plethora of studies on the negative effects of poor teaching strategies and classroom environment on students’ thinking, it is essential to investigate this phenomenon in a particular context and setting to serve the local professionals. It is significant to investigate such a problem in a setting where there are lack of teachers, where there are lack of textbooks and technology, where there are large class sizes, a setting where the academically “weak” are recruited for training and in a setting where the culture of the society bestows on the teacher absolute powers in the classroom. There is therefore, the need to investigate the present state of affairs in Ghanaian teacher institutions and what can be done to promote better thinking. Method The study sought to answer these questions: How do the teaching strategies employed by Ghanaian initial teacher educators and the classroom ecology they create affects the thinking skills of pre-service teachers? And what can be done to improve pre-service teachers’ thinking through teaching methods and classroom ecology? The study employed a qualitative case study approach to investigate the problem at Akatakyiman Teacher Training College (a pseudonym) in Ghana. Teachers in science, mathematics and social studies and students were interviewed and observed. 2010-09-23T00:00:00Z http://41.74.91.244:8080/handle/123456789/4626 Language, Education and Linguistic Human Rights in Ghana Owu-Ewie, C. The use of the familiar language of learners as medium of instruction (MoI) promotes quality education. However, sixty years after independence, Ghana is still grappling with the issue of which language to use in education. Currently, the language policy of education in Ghana mandates the use of the child’s first language as MoI only up to Primary Three. This paper uses both primary and secondary sources to argue that the current language policy violates the Linguistic Human Rights (LHR) of the Ghanaian child. To end this violation, the paper argues for the addition of more L1s as MoI, the cultivation of a positive attitude towards the use of L1 as MoI, the constitutional provision on the obligatory use of L1 as MoI, the establishment of structures to monitor the implementation of the language policy and a sociolinguistic study of language representation in the lower primary classroom 2017-09-30T00:00:00Z http://41.74.91.244:8080/handle/123456789/4625 On tone and morphophonology of the Akan reduplication construction Abakah, E.N. Reduplication in Akan has received some discussion in the literature but all the studies have concentrated on some aspects of segmental processes that operate on the base to generate the output. In this paper, we study the morphological, segmental and tonal processes related to reduplicative construction in Akan. We demonstrate that on the basis of tonal perturbations which bases and reduplicative templates undergo, and the output tone melody of the reduplicated form vis-à-vis the tone melody of the base, we are able to tell the base from the reduplicant in the Akan reduplicative structure. We argue in the central portions of this paper that the reduplicant in Akan could be either prefixed or suffixed to the base and, in the course of further reduplication construction, it could be sited within the two constituent tokens of the original reduplicative output which serves as an unmarked base for further reduplication. This piece of information counterexemplifies the assertion in the existing literature that in the Akan reduplication construction, the reduplicant is invariably prefixed to the base. In this paper, we study reduplication of verbs, adjectives, nouns, and lexical reduplication and demonstrate that words belonging to the same class behave tonally the same. 2015-12-01T00:00:00Z