Information and communications technologies in library facilities in disadvantaged rural schools in South Africa: Lessons from Limpopo province

Abstract

Universally, information and communications technologies (ICTs) have revolutionised multiple ways of executing tasks in many sectors. In the education sector, ICTs provide a scaffold to enhance technology-driven teaching and learning information needs of the teachers and learners in a school environment. The aim of the study was to investigate the availability and use of ICTs in library facilities in primary schools in disadvantaged rural communities in Limpopo province, South Africa. The study targeted all 18 primary schools in Lebopo Circuit of Mankweng Cluster. Self-administered questionnaires were used to collect data from teacher-librarians who attended a school library workshop at a local high school. Purposive sampling was employed in the selection of the teacher-librarians and all 18 schools were represented by one teacher-librarian. The findings indicate that there are few ICTs used by the teachers to enhance teaching and learning in different library facilities in disadvantaged rural schools. The study recommends that additional ICTs should be procured by the Department of Basic Education (DBE) for distribution to all schools to mitigate technology-driven information needs of teachers and learners. Furthermore, as vandalism was cited as a challenge in all schools, security needs upgrading to protect the few available ICTs.