Abstract:
Teacher education programmes are developed around the theoretical and practical understanding
of child development, learning, assessment, behaviour management and motivation, which
are areas of expertise in educational psychology. This paper aims to (a) critically investigate the contribution
of educational psychology in the training of preservice teachers at South African universities
and (b) understand the distribution of educational psychologists in public schools to support teaching
and learning. A narrative literature review and email requests for unpublished documents from four
educational psychologists were used as methods to collect literature in order to answer the following
questions: What contribution does educational psychology make to training preservice teachers
at public universities in South Africa? What contributions do educational psychologists make to
support learners in South African public schools? Analysis was carried out by identifying recurring
patterns in the literature reviewed. This study found that of the 26 public universities in South
Africa, there are only 6 universities that offer educational psychology programmes. Educational
psychology programmes in higher education institutions are in decline, leading to a decrease in
the number of qualified educational psychologists. This decline negatively affects the involvement
of educational psychologists in training preservice teachers in educational psychology modules or
courses. Therefore, the inclusion of educational psychology as a core or fundamental module in the
curriculum of preservice teachers to avoid dependence on the decreasing number of educational
psychologists in higher education institutions is key. An increase in teacher training programmes
in higher education should be merged with an equal increase in educational psychology core or
fundamental courses in the curriculum of preservice teachers.
