The purpose of this study is to reconceptualise orthographic knowledge in ITE for isiXhosa FP literacy instruction, to inform teacher preparation, curriculum development and instructional practice.

The specific objectives are to: (1) investigate how orthographic knowledge of isiXhosa is conceptualised in ITE curricula for FP teachers, (2) identify the gaps between teachers’ linguistic knowledge and the orthographic requirements of isiXhosa literacy instruction, (3) analyse how pedagogical practices and assessment strategies in ITE programmes affect the development of orthographic knowledge, and (4) propose evidence-based recommendations to improve the integration of orthographic knowledge in teacher training.

To address the objectives that are stated under the aim of this study, the study is guided by the following questions: (1) How is orthographic knowledge of isiXhosa conceptualised and represented within ITE curricula for FP teacher candidates? and (2) What are the perceived challenges and gaps in the orthographic knowledge of the FP teachers about isiXhosa literacy instruction?

This study uses a qualitative document analysis approach, a method effective in systematically examining written policy texts to interpret meaning, identify patterns and conclude both implicit and explicit content (Bowen 2009; Morgan 2020). Document analysis allows researchers to explore how language and concepts, such as orthographic knowledge, are portrayed in formal curriculum policies without collecting primary data from participants. It has been widely used in education policy research to assess curriculum content and interpret policy intentions (Bowen 2009; Cardno 2020).

The study investigates the South African FP CAPS for isiXhosa Home Language, which sets national standards for literacy content, outcomes and assessment methods in public schools. Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement functions as the official policy document that guides teaching and learning in public schools and is used by teacher educators to develop course content in ITE programmes. Although primarily document-based, it is situated within the broader context of multilingual and socio-cultural educational practices in South Africa, where linguistic diversity influences literacy pedagogy and curriculum implementation (Yafele & Makalela 2022).

The analytical population encompassed all official CAPS documentation for the FP isiXhosa Home Language. Selection was deliberate and based on criteria: only sections directly related to language instruction, including phonemic awareness, syllable structures, spelling conventions, reading and writing outcomes. This method ensures that all pertinent orthographic and linguistic content needed to address the research questions is thoroughly analysed (Bowen 2009; Morgan 2020).

This study does not involve experimental or intervention groups. Instead, it employs analytical techniques to examine the policy text itself. The ‘comparison’ in this context is conceptual, evaluating implicit versus explicit representations of orthographic knowledge within CAPS guidelines and expectations in relation to teacher preparation needs.

Data were gathered through a systematic review and extraction of policy content from CAPS curriculum documents for the isiXhosa Home Language. A structured data extraction protocol was devised to identify instances in which linguistic features and orthographic elements appeared, along with descriptions of literacy outcomes, teachers’ expectations and alignment with ITE competencies. Document analysis as a research method is widely recognised for its ability to uncover hidden assumptions and patterns within policy texts without the need for additional field data (Bowen 2009; Cardno 2020).

The analysis used a thematic document analysis approach, appropriate for qualitative policy research, involving the systematic detection of patterns and themes within textual data. The process encompassed the following steps:

Thematic analysis of policy documents is well-established in qualitative research, enabling researchers to derive meaningful insights from structured texts and to connect findings to wider educational theory and practice (Braun & Clarke 2006), aligning with qualitative synthesis methods. Triangulation through iterative coding and peer review was used to ensure the analytical rigour and reliability of the findings in different sections of the curriculum.

Because this study analyses publicly available policy documents rather than involving human participants, the risks were minimal; however, the ethical principles of transparency, analytic integrity and accurate reporting were maintained throughout. This article followed all ethical standards for research without direct contact with human or animal subjects. Document analysis avoided concerns about participant recruitment, consent and confidentiality, rendering it a low-risk methodology with strong validity for policy interpretation (Morgan 2020).

The FP isiXhosa CAPS offers clear, systematic guidance on phonemic awareness, recognition, segmentation, blending and sound manipulation, through regular routines linking letters to sounds (izandi zopelo). Learners practise these skills orally, in reading, and in writing, with examples, such as b + a = ba and b + e = be showing a structured progression from sound recognition to basic syllable construction.

This indicates that CAPS conceptualises early literacy predominantly through a phonological pathway. From a PCK standpoint, this high degree of explicitness is pedagogically advantageous, as the content is rendered visible and systematically sequenced, making it more amenable to instruction. Teachers are provided with clearly defined entry points for modelling grapheme–phoneme correspondences and for monitoring learners’ developmental trajectories. Nonetheless, comparatively little explicit attention is paid to other critical dimensions of early literacy, including writing conventions, orthographic knowledge and text organisation, all of which are also essential for learners’ subsequent academic achievement.

Syllable structures, including mono- and polysyllables and consonant clusters, are outlined in part within CAPS (pages 21–25). Simple syllable patterns are introduced in Grade R and develop into polysyllabic words and consonant clusters by Grade 2. For example, learners encounter syllable combinations, such as ba, be, bi, bo, bu, and clusters, such as mb and bh. Although these exercises provide concrete examples, explicit rules for cluster formation and syllable complexity are not fully explained, resulting in a medium level of explicitness (as indicated in Table 1). Consequently, teachers-in-training must interpret the progression and plan scaffolded lessons, relying on their judgement to deliver orthographically consistent instruction.

Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement combines explicit and implicit spelling instruction (pp. 16, 22). In the early years, it encourages invented or phonetic spelling, allowing learners to approximate words using sound-based strategies, before gradually introducing conventional spelling. This progression reflects developmental writing practices and aligns with emergent literacy and stage theories, which highlight the role of invented spelling in literacy development. By drawing on these frameworks, the curriculum presents written language as emerging in stages, with invented spelling as a key step towards conventional orthography, thereby framing its approach to instruction.

The curriculum offers little explicit guidance on how the transition from invented to conventional spelling should occur. In the FP Home Language CAPS (Department of Basic Education 2011:34–36), spelling is described only in broad terms, focusing on activities, such as ‘using phonics and phonemic awareness strategies’ and ‘writing common words from memory’. It does not specify how teachers should manage this shift, and key orthographic principles, such as conjunctive writing and spelling regularities are not clearly formalised. The move from phonetic approximations to standard forms is therefore unclear. Instead of outlining a step-by-step progression or exemplars, CAPS relies on teachers’ classroom judgement, so spelling instruction depends heavily on individual practice (Pretorius & Stoffelsma 2017).

Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement for FP provides clear guidance on decoding, fluency, comprehension and vocabulary (pp. 16–18, 26–27). Also, CAPS formulates explicit targets for reading development, encompassing decoding, fluency, comprehension and vocabulary acquisition. It prescribes instructional approaches, such as guided reading, paired reading and small-group activities, reflecting a strong emphasis on interactive classroom practices and sustained engagement with texts. While decoding and fluency are associated with phonics-based instruction, the curriculum allocates comparatively limited attention to higher-order orthographic processes. Specifically, it seldom addresses how learners recognise and parse morphologically complex and extended word forms, how they process conjunctively written structures or how they mobilise orthographic knowledge to infer the meanings and pronunciations of unfamiliar lexical items. Consequently, reading is framed primarily as repetitive practice, rather than as systematic engagement with a language-specific orthographic system.

From a sociocultural perspective, the collaborative reading strategies in CAPS are pedagogically valuable, as literacy develops through guided participation, scaffolding and mediated learning in social interaction. However, to meet the linguistic and cognitive demands of reading, CAPS should explicitly address the orthographic features of isiXhosa. This would help learners develop a principled understanding of the writing system and engage with written isiXhosa more efficiently and in greater depth. Hence, the CAPS stipulates that, Inkalo nganye mayifundiswe ngokugqibeleleyo, rhoqo yonke imihla [each of these components needs to be taught explicitly and fully, on a daily basis] … Ukuqonda izandi (Phonic awareness) and/or ingqiqo ngezandi, ukuqonda igama [phonic recognition, word recognition] and/or amagama [words] (Department of Basic Education 2011). Although frequent practice is emphasised, the orthographic rules underlying these exercises are not formalised, leaving teachers to apply this knowledge independently.

Table 1 shows that orthographic knowledge in the FP isiXhosa CAPS is distributed along a continuum of explicitness. It is most explicit in phonemic awareness and basic grapheme–phoneme correspondence activities, moderately explicit in work on syllable structure and some writing tasks, and least explicit in relation to spelling conventions, conjunctive forms and the principled use of orthography in reading and extended writing.

This distribution has three main implications. Firstly, orthographic knowledge is not systematically embedded across the curriculum but appears in fragmented form. Secondly, CAPS seems to assume that teachers have sufficient linguistic and orthographic expertise to infer and bridge these gaps. Thirdly, this shifts responsibility to ITE programmes to supply knowledge that policy does not fully specify. For pre-service teachers, especially those with limited isiXhosa linguistic training, this likely leads to largely procedural implementation of CAPS activities, without strong conceptual understanding of underlying orthographic principles. Consequently, the curriculum’s effectiveness may depend less on policy clarity than on individual teachers’ linguistic and orthographic expertise.

The findings indicate that, although CAPS establishes a substantive foundation for early literacy through an emphasis on phonics, routine reading and basic writing, it does not systematically conceptualise or operationalise orthography as a core organising principle of literacy pedagogy. Consequently, forms of knowledge are foregrounded while others remain peripheral or tacit, producing curricular and pedagogical misalignments that have implications for teacher preparation, instructional coherence and equitable literacy attainment in isiXhosa FP contexts.

The analysis indicates that the FP isiXhosa CAPS allocates orthographic content unevenly across literacy domains, rendering some aspects of teacher knowledge explicit while leaving other areas largely implicit. The curriculum provides its most detailed guidance on phonemic awareness and basic phoneme–grapheme correspondences, thereby conceptualising early literacy predominantly through a sound-based model of reading.

In contrast, several orthographic dimensions that are central to the development of fluent reading and accurate writing, such as syllable structure and complexity, spelling regularities, conjunctive forms and the systematic integration of orthography in both reading and writing, receive minimal explicit treatment. As shown in Table 1, curriculum guidance is concentrated on initial decoding skills, while more complex orthographic conventions are communicated primarily through isolated examples rather than through generalisable principles.

From a PCK perspective, the curriculum tends to provide teachers with procedural guidelines without sufficiently equipping them with the underlying conceptual knowledge required to explain orthographic patterns, diagnose learner errors or effectively support learners’ progression from emergent to conventional literacy. Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement appears to presuppose a high level of orthographic expertise among teachers and does not offer systematic support for bridging phonetic and conventional spelling or for applying language-specific orthographic principles.

Consequently, ITE programmes may need to place greater emphasis on the development of isiXhosa orthographic knowledge, linguistic analysis skills and language-responsive literacy pedagogy. Strengthening the alignment between curriculum content, teacher preparation and classroom practice is essential for fulfilling policy intentions and advancing educational equity.

The CAPS foregrounds phonemic awareness but leaves many aspects of orthography largely implicit. It gives detailed guidance on phoneme identification, blending, segmentation and basic phoneme–grapheme correspondences, in line with strong evidence that systematic phonics is effective in relatively transparent orthographies (Ehri 2020; Share 2021). However, as the curriculum advances, explicit guidance declines for key orthographic dimensions, such as increasing syllabic complexity, conjunctive and disjunctive orthographic forms, spelling patterns and regularities, and how orthographic knowledge supports both reading and writing. Research shows that curricula typically emphasise basic decoding while downplaying orthographic and morphological knowledge needed for fluent reading and accurate spelling (Apel, Brimo & Diehm 2023; Bowers & Bowers 2023). In CAPS, orthographic knowledge appears mainly as part of broader classroom activities rather than as explicit, systematically taught content. Learners receive structured instruction in phonological awareness and decoding but far less systematic teaching of the principles by which phonemes and graphemes form words and extended texts. The curriculum thus provides a strong base for initial decoding but comparatively weak support for developing higher-level accuracy, reading fluency and written language proficiency in later grades.

A further central argument concerns the extent to which CAPS rests on implicit assumptions regarding teachers’ specialised knowledge. The curriculum frequently prescribes literacy activities without explicitly articulating the underlying linguistic principles. Consequently, teachers are implicitly required to analyse orthographic patterns, design appropriate progression trajectories and scaffold learners’ development from phonetic to conventional spelling.

Viewed through the theoretical framework of PCK, these expectations are particularly consequential. Pedagogical content knowledge presupposes that teachers possess not only robust disciplinary knowledge but also well-developed pedagogical strategies for rendering that knowledge accessible to learners. In the context of early literacy, this entails the capacity to diagnose and interpret learners’ errors, sequence instructional content coherently, and provide explicit, accurate explanations of spelling conventions.

Empirical studies demonstrate that numerous teachers – particularly those operating in linguistically heterogeneous and multilingual educational settings – self-report insufficient preparedness to teach foundational domains of linguistic knowledge, including phonology, morphology and orthography (Daries & Bowles 2024; Joshi et al. 2021; König et al. 2022). This body of evidence implies that the policy directives articulated in CAPS may confer disproportionate advantages on more experienced or better-prepared teachers, who are able to infer the implicit linguistic rationales and translate these into effective pedagogical practices. Conversely, teachers with comparatively weaker disciplinary or pedagogical knowledge bases may be more inclined to implement mandated activities in a largely procedural or rote manner, without a robust conceptual understanding of the underlying literacy constructs.

Accordingly, the primary issue pertains not only to the content explicitly delineated in CAPS but also to the extent and nature of the specialised expertise that the curriculum implicitly assumes on the part of teachers.

The third argument concerns how the implicit treatment of orthographic knowledge in CAPS shapes teacher preparation and, in turn, educational equity. When key orthographic principles are not explicitly articulated in curriculum policy, ITE is required to compensate for this omission, particularly in the FP, in which the quality of instruction is critical for establishing robust early literacy skills.

This study examined CAPS and did not directly analyse ITE curricula; accordingly, observations regarding teacher education are inferential and remain at the level of policy critique rather than constituting evaluations of specific programmes. Nevertheless, a growing body of South African research consistently highlights uneven preparation of teachers for early literacy instruction, with especially pronounced gaps in African languages, in which pedagogical resources and materials remain scarce (Pretorius 2023; Pretorius & Machet 2020; Spaull, Pretorius & Mohohlwane 2023).

From a sociocultural perspective, these curricular omissions are fundamentally intertwined with issues of educational equity. Learners’ opportunities to develop literacy are structured by their access to well-prepared teachers, sufficient instructional resources and pedagogical practices that are culturally and linguistically responsive. Teachers with robust professional preparation and ongoing support are better equipped to facilitate learners’ acquisition of orthographic principles, whereas those who receive limited training are more likely to provide instruction that is constrained in scope and fragmented in nature. Empirical research indicates that when critical forms of disciplinary and pedagogical knowledge are unevenly distributed across educational contexts, curriculum reforms in isolation are inadequate to generate equitable learning outcomes (Kim & Petscher 2021; Pretorius 2023).

Overall, the findings suggest that although the FP isiXhosa CAPS formally foregrounds phonics, it tends to subordinate orthography. Core dimensions of spelling, morphological structure and the explicit application of orthographic knowledge are frequently presumed rather than systematically taught. This implicit orientation increases the interpretive burden placed on teachers and is likely to intensify variability and inequities in curriculum enactment across classrooms. Accordingly, the study recommends that orthography be conceptualised and specified more explicitly within curriculum policy, and that teacher education programmes be enhanced to integrate phonological, orthographic and pedagogical preparation in language-specific and practice-oriented ways. Framing orthography as a constitutive and central component of early literacy, rather than as an ancillary extension of phonics, has the potential to foster more coherent, equitable and contextually responsive isiXhosa literacy instruction (Bowers & Bowers 2023; Daries & Bowles 2024).

Drawing on PCK and sociocultural literacy perspectives, the study makes recommendations for policy, ITE and in-service development.

Grounded in the theoretical frameworks of Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK) and sociocultural perspectives on literacy, this study identifies three interrelated levers for systemic reform in education policy, initial teacher education (ITE), and in-service professional development.

This study is constrained by its exclusive reliance on qualitative document analysis of the FP isiXhosa CAPS. Although document analysis facilitates a detailed interrogation of policy assumptions and the degree of curricular explicitness, it does not capture how teachers interpret, mediate or operationalise orthographic knowledge in classroom practice (Bowen 2009; Braun & Clarke 2021). Furthermore, the study does not draw on empirical data from ITE programmes, teacher educators or FP teachers, thereby limiting the strength of inferences that can be made regarding actual instructional practices and teachers’ orthographic knowledge (Creswell & Poth 2018). The focus on isiXhosa additionally restricts the generalisability of the findings to other African languages. Nonetheless, emerging research indicates that comparable orthographic and curriculum-related challenges are likely to be evident across a range of African-language literacy contexts (Pretorius 2023; Spaull et al. 2023).

Future research should move beyond policy analysis to examine how orthographic knowledge is enacted, developed and mediated in real educational settings, drawing on perspectives on PCK and sociocultural literacy. Three priorities emerge.