Teach outside your comfort zone: A qualitative study of higher education students’ conceptions in Namibia

Abstract Namibian Higher Education Institutions offer education at the levels of certificate, diploma, undergraduate degree and some other post graduate levels and each typically pursues different levels of capacity in skill and knowledge development for their graduates. However, systematic investigations of students’ conceptions of good teaching are hardly carried as the focus tend to be on teachers’ views. Qualitative data was collected through face-to-face focus group discussions and was analysed using the Noticing, Collecting and Thinking method of analysis. It was found that good teaching requires teachers who operate using the student-centred, learning oriented conception framework. Such are teachers who ensure students understand the content of the subjects, understand students’ problems, are punctual and provide opportunities for students to access learning resources. Although many of the findings from this paper may not be unique from the existing literature, the implication of the absence of unique insights is that methods of instruction and administration continue to be modified to reach students’ hearts. This study contributes to furthering knowledge about good teaching in higher education institutions and its attributes in Namibia and analyses how this is different from developed countries.


Introduction
This phenomenological case study explores what twenty-two tertiary education students consider as good teaching in Namibia. The paper is written by young academics who have recently started their teaching careers but were keen to get views from students on what they consider as good teaching as most of the current literature only focuses on teachers' views (Duarte, 2013;

PUBLIC INTEREST STATEMENT
Interest in students' conceptions of good teaching has risen in countries such as Finland, UK, China and Israel but, to the researchers' knowledge, there has been no systematic investigation of students' conceptions of good teaching pursued in Namibia. This is a qualitative study of students' conceptions of good teaching. Data was collected through face-to-face focus group discussions. It was found that teaching encompasses more than just instruction on how to do something. Good teaching requires good teachers to be confident, ensure students understand the content of the subjects, requires teachers to be more understanding towards students, to be punctual and to provide needed learning resources to students. The paper also argues that good teaching should not only be viewed as the sole responsibility of the teacher but it also requires active engagement from students. The hints provided by students are valuable resources for teachers, especially those beginning their teaching careers. Kwan, 2000;Parpala & Lindblom-Ylänne, 2007;Tavakoli & Baniasad-Azad, 2017). With few years of experience and a desire to be better teachers the following quote motivated the authors to write this paper.
"Good teaching and good learning are linked through the student's experience of what we do. It follows that we cannot teach better unless we are able to see what we are doing from their point of view" (Ramsden, 2003, p. 84).
Achieving the aim of responding to domestic and global challenges is challenging in continents where the development of tertiary education has been deliberately neglected, as has been the case in most parts of Africa (European University Association, 2010). The considerable challenges that African universities face include the growing demand for access with more young people graduating from primary and secondary education, attracting and retaining students and ensuring the successful completion of their studies. Other challenges include retaining staff and ensuring appropriate working environments, conditions and career prospects. The quality and relevance of learning and research are further concerns, particularly given the rapid expansion of higher education in Africa (European University Association, 2010). The pressure on universities and other higher education providers is therefore tremendous.
Academics and scholars talk of "quality teaching" and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) focus on quality teaching as well (UNESCO, 2021). () as compared to "good teaching". This paper focused on "good teaching" in order to allow for comparison with international literature that has used similar terms. For example, there has been a great deal of research on what constitutes good teaching from teachers' perspectives (Duarte, 2013;Kember & Kwan, 2000;Parpala & Lindblom-Ylänne, 2007;Tavakoli & Baniasad-Azad, 2017). At the same time, interest in students' conceptions of good teaching has risen in developed countries such as Finland (Parpala et al., 2011), UK (Su et al., 2012), China (Kember et al., 2004) and Israel (Alhija, 2017).
To the researcher's knowledge, there has been no systematic investigation of students' conceptions of good teaching pursued in Namibia. This is a problem because literature argues that to bring about good education, implementing structures is not enough, the students' conception of what constitutes good university teaching also needs to be addressed (Hermann, 2013). With this gap in the Namibian education literature, the researchers thought to focus on students in terms of getting their views on what constitutes good university teaching. Good teaching in this paper represents concepts such as effective, exemplary, excellent and quality teaching as in Alhija's (2017) paper.

Higher education in Namibia
Namibian Higher Education Institutions offer education at the levels of certificate, diploma, undergraduate degree and some other post-graduate levels and each typically pursues different levels of capacity in skill and knowledge development for their graduates (Matengu et al., 2014). Although higher education (HE) is young and relatively new in Namibia (since 1980s), there has been an increase in the number of higher education institutions, from having the University of Namibia (UNAM) as the only higher education institution at independence in March 1990, to having the Namibia University of Science and Technology (NUST) and a private university, namely the International University of Management (IUM), both founded in 1994 (Matengu et al., 2014). Despite an increase in the number of higher education institutions, Namibia is still challenged due to a lack of a national education system that allows learners and students to achieve learning objectives as and when they need them through the provision of a strong general education base, flexible delivery of a flexible curriculum, combined with new teaching methodologies that should be in place by 2030 in order to achieve Vision 2030 (Government of the Republic of Namibia, 2004). Such a system requires students with flexible enquiring minds and critical thinking skills, capable of adapting to new situations and demands and continuously learning from own initiative. These are characteristics which should be developed by well-qualified teachers (Government of the Republic of Namibia, 2004). For this reason, urgent action is needed to ensure that the country has the necessary tertiary education capacity to respond to the local and global challenges of the future (Government of the Republic of Namibia, 2004). This is an ambitious task, not just for Namibia, but for Africa, as it requires major investment in capacity building (European University Association, 2010). In many African countries including Namibia there is poor infrastructure for producing, publishing, translating, and developing teaching materials and methods locally (Teferra & Altbach, 2004). Most teachers in Namibia are used to the traditional teaching and learning methods that take students' as passive listeners, and therefore resist to the change to learner-centered approach to teaching (Kasanda et al., 2005). The resistance to learning other methods of teaching can be a barrier to achieving quality education. Concerns are not only around capacity building, but also around other improvements needed including expanding and updating infrastructure (lecture halls, laboratory facilities, internet connectivity plus extensive use of the same), Research and Development (R&D), and coordination of higher education institutions (National Council for Higher education, 2010). In addition to these challenges, there is a growing debate on pedagogical approaches to learning in higher education and this puts pressure on teachers to deliver, communicate and assess students effectively (Kaynardag, 2017).
Of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) developed in 2015, SDG4 is dedicated to education. By 2030 it is aimed that there is equal access for all women and men to affordable and quality technical, vocational and tertiary education, including university. Higher education also forms an important part of other goals related to poverty (SDG1); health and well-being (SDG3); gender equality (SDG5) governance; decent work and economic growth (SDG8); responsible consumption and production (SDG12); climate change (SDG13); and peace, justice and strong institutions (SDG16). The contribution of higher education to other goals such as reduction of poverty, health and wellbeing and responsible consumption can only be achieved if good education is provided (UNESCO, 2019).
The research question that this paper seeks to answer is: What is considered good teaching by university students in Namibia?

Teacher-and student focused teaching
There is a mix of ideas on what constitutes good teaching. Entwistle, Skinner, Entwistle and Orr (2010), defined good teaching as an extended awareness of the relationship between learning and teaching. Apart from it being an extended awareness of learning and teaching, good teaching is also ascribed to personality traits, a construct that some researchers label dispositions (Bustos-Orosa, 2008). This means that good teaching is the confluence of several critical factors such as personality-based dispositions, teaching competence, content mastery and expertise, and pedagogical knowledge (Bustos-Orosa, 2008). While teaching in higher education is a complex endeavour (Skelton, 2004). Ramsden (2003, p. 210) posits that teaching is a "contested concept" with no universally accepted definition. The difficulty in defining good teaching can be attributed to the variety of teaching approaches discussed in literature (see, e.g., Barr & Tagg, 1995;Dolmans et al., 2005). Because of the variations in teaching methods, there are variations in students' conceptions of good teaching (Päuler-Kuppinger & Jucks, 2017). Regardless of the methods used, several authors posit that good teaching supports and aids students in achieving learning outcomes. (see, e.g., Alhija, 2017;Duarte, 2013;Derounian, 2017) and the indicators of good teaching encompasses configuration of learning spaces and classroom organisation, classroom management and discipline, curriculum structuring and planning, teaching strategies, self-directed strategies, and peer tutoring.
Conception is referred to as "specific meanings attached to phenomena which then mediate our response to situations involving those phenomena" (Kember & Kwan, 2000, p. 483). (Kember & Kwan, 2000) argue that we form conceptions of virtually every aspect of our perceived world, and in so doing, use those abstract representations to delimit something from, and relate it to, other aspects of our world. In effect, as humans, we view the world through the lenses of our conceptions, interpreting and acting in accordance with our understanding of the world' (Kember & Kwan, 2000, p. 483). Two extreme conceptions of teaching are identified by Entwistle et al. (2010) which are: (1) Teacher-focused, content-oriented (2) Student-focused, learning-oriented In a teacher-focused conception, teachers believe it is their duty and responsibility to help students develop the specific knowledge and skills which are needed to pass the examinations although this may narrow the education passed on. Here, approaches to good teaching are strongly influenced by the lecturer's conception of teaching (Kember & Kwan, 2000). However, Duarte (2013) suggested that teachers' conceptions need to take more than one approach to teaching. These approaches can include collaboration between teachers and students, storytelling, and refining higher order skills such as reflection and critical thinking.
A student-focused, learning-oriented conception views teaching as bringing inquiry to life, the inquiry that learning is constantly challenging students in a lecture to think something through for themselves using a conversational style to maintain a sense of theatre, creating and taking opportunities to engage students' interest and thinking (Entwistle et al., 2010, p. 3). In student-centered approaches there is the view that knowledge is not a static amount of content, but is what the learner actively constructs and creates from experience and interaction within the socio-cultural context. For example, Jarvis (2014) argue that adult students often know a great deal from experience about the subject they registered and so the teachers have to develop new methods of teaching after they have diagnosed the position, experience and knowledge of students prior to teaching. Education is not an affair of "telling" and being told, but an active and constructive process, which in principle is almost as generally violated in practice as conceded in theory (Dewey, 1916). This process is usually preached, it is lectured; it is written about but its enactment into practice requires that the school environment be equipped with agencies for doing, with tools and physical materials, to an extent rarely attained. It requires that methods of instruction and administration be modified to reach students' hearts (Dewey, 1916). A wide variety of methods to use include class visits, demonstration teaching, microteaching (for those studying towards the field of Education), team teaching, group work, individual study and tasks, seminars, tutorials and lectures; contemporarily, all the methods used ought to include, among other things, Information Communication and Technology (ICT) opportunities at one time or another (Namibia Institute for Education Development [NIED], 2007). Hodgson (1984) opined that students with a deep approach preferred stimulating and challenging teaching, while students opting for a surface approach looked for teaching which was less demanding. Thus, there should be an expectation for students to vary quite considerably in their reactions to the same teaching methods. Because of this variation, the most powerful research on learning in education is the one that incorporates both the acquisition metaphor and the participation metaphor of teaching because no two students have the same need and no two teachers arrive at the best performance in the same way. Thus, sticking to one metaphor and/or one conceptual framework and ignoring the other completely may not be the best option as it could be hazardous (Sfard, 1998). The two frameworks (teacher-centered and student-centered) guided data collection and analysis for this study and we use the terms "teacher" and "lecturer" interchangeably in this paper.

Framework factors in Namibia
Hindering good education that is student-centered constitutes major factors that obstruct and facilitate good teaching and learning in Namibia. The factors that hinder the provision of good education are among others: the majority of financial resources are spent on personnel factors, which impacts negatively the allocation of resources to teaching and learning materials, assistive technologies for students with disabilities, and the building and maintenance of requisite facilities such as library facilities and residence halls (Hora & Smolarek, 2018;McDonald, 2019) as well as the use of substandard material during replacement of facilities (Ogunbayo & Aigbavboa, 2019). Teachers and students complain of overcrowded rooms, inadequate assistive technology and devices in their classrooms for power point presentations, and a lack of magnifiers, computers, hardware and software such as large keyboards and screen-reading and enlarging products (e.g., JAWS and Zoomtext respectively; (Ministry of Education, Guyana, 2017). Harding and Engelbrecht (2017) opined that organizational fluency such as suitable and well-equipped venues, and the skillful use of technology is essential for effective learning to take place, especially in large classes. The use technology is further emphasized in Haberman (2010) that whenever teachers involve students with the technology of information access, good teaching happens. The lack of these factors sometimes force teachers to engage teachercentered teaching rather than student centered teaching, especially when it comes to addressing the challenge of paying attention to each individual student.

Responsive pedagogy
The theory guiding this paper is that of responsive pedagogy. Responsive pedagogy refers to recursive dialogue between the student's internal feedback and the external feedback provided by significant others, e.g., teachers, throughout the three phases of self-regulation; forethoughts, monitoring and reflection (Smith et al., 2016). A vital part of responsive pedagogy is the explicit intention of the teacher to make learners believe in their own competence and ability to successfully complete tasks and meet challenges, to strengthen students' self-efficacy in relation to a specific domain/task and to increase their overall self-concept.
When investigating students' perceptions of good teaching in China, (Kember et al., 2004), the descriptions which students gave of good teaching were diverse. The descriptions included teachers who were concerned about students' learning and could spend hours with each student, explaining and helping students learn with the right tools. Further, teachers also assisted by empowering students with the tools to learn on their own, and take responsibility for their own learning, encouraging students to explore and construct their knowledge.
In Finland, Kember et al., 2004, p. 88) and Parpala et al. (2011) found that the students at the University of Helsinki viewed good teaching as teaching that laid out clear goals. Teachers gave coherent presentations, supported critical thinking and interacted with the students while in a study of Israeli students' conception of good teaching, the assessment dimension was viewed as most important. Students considered grades that instructors assign to students, and the grading method instructors followed, as critical aspects of good teaching. The assessment dimension is more important to undergraduate students because grades are important for enrolments in advanced studies and for obtaining rewarding employment (Alhija, 2017).
Focusing on Anglo-Saxon countries, Henard and Leprince-Ringuet (2008) opined that "good teachers" have empathy for students, are generally experienced and most of all, are organized and expressive. These are teachers who have a passion: a passion for learning, for their field, for teaching and for their students' needs and interests.
While there are different attributes expressed by students as to who is a good teacher, Romaniuk (2018) opined that good teaching only comes about when there is active engagement of students during lectures (Romaniuk, 2018). This can be through group work or providing activities that allow for alternative responses and solutions to contribute to learning (Haberman, 2010). This means that students are required to take an active part in their learning, rather than being passive while the teacher lectures or engages in other forms of direct teaching. The key strategy for changing the student's role from passive to active learning is to engage learners in cooperative learning. In cooperative learning situations, students work in small and big groups to achieve a shared set of goals relating to academic assignments. All group members are expected to contribute to the work of the group by sharing their ideas, helping to solve (address) problems, arguing intellectually in order to reach an agreement, and working toward the goal (Johnson & Johnson, 2008).
Drawing on themes identified in the literature to conceptualise good teaching, we infer that good teaching is teaching that empowers students to learn better and further. Good teachers guide students to access relevant content, good teachers have subject knowledge, good personalities and assist students to ensure understanding. Student conceptualisations of good teaching entails teaching that motivates students to learn by aligning it to the curriculum, gives assessments and provide feedback on those assessments.
Guided by the literature above, we have constructed the parameters of what good teaching is and what it is not in Table 1.
Insert Table 1 here Studies of this nature are few in Africa, particularly in Namibia. We found it important to conduct this study in order to contribute towards the goal of achieving quality education in Namibia and realise Vision 2030 (National Planning Commission, 2012).

Research design and methodology
This is a qualitative study of students' conceptions of good teaching. Qualitative research yields rich and multi-layered data that can generate "thick descriptions" of the experiences of the participants (Geertz, 1973). It is also ideal for exploring the conceptions of teaching in higher education as a complex, multi-dimensional and multi-layered endeavour (Duarte, 2013). By using qualitative methodology, a case study research design by way of in-depth semi-structured interviews was followed. The researchers believed that a case study was the best methodology to use because the study intended to explore and contribute to the understanding of good teaching from the students' perspectives (Yin, 2009). This study sought to investigate a contemporary phenomenon within the institutions of higher learning and participants' real-life settings. The aim was to understand the depth rather than the breadth of the issues concerning good teaching on the ground. The researchers believed that the data needed for this study could be gathered more effectively by using this approach as opposed to others.

Study population and target population
The researchers targeted a specific population, in this case, students from the International University of Management (IUM). IUM is a private university located in the capital city of Windhoek, Namibia. The target population was final year students.

Study sample
Final year (fourth year) undergraduate students made up the sample as they had spent more years at university compared to 1 st , 2 nd and 3 rd year students, therefore they had more experience and interaction with the lecturers. The specific study sample out of the 4 th years students were those who had at least 80% full-time class attendance. Information on attendance was obtained from lecturers. The authors purposively chose students who had 80% class attendance because since they attend class regularly, it is expected that they would have better views about their teachers' practices.

Sample size
The data was collected using focus group discussions. The first group was comprised of six final-year students from the Education faculty. The second group was comprised of eight final year students from the Business Administration Faculty. The third group was comprised of five final year students from the Strategic Management faculty while the fourth group was comprised of three final year students from the Education Faculty. This resulted in a total of 22 students. Twenty-two is considered an adequate number because the sample size in the majority of qualitative studies generally follows the concept of saturation-when the collection of new data does not shed any further light on the issue under investigation (Mason, 2010). It was for this reason that the authors divided the students into groups because by the time of talking to the fourth group, the study had already generated about 30 repetitive codes. Besides, the purpose of the paper was not to maximise numbers but to obtain a level of saturation with information on the topic (Padgett, 1998). Table 2 illustrates the data material in terms of each focus groups' number of participants, faculty's affiliation and gender representation.

Data collection
After approval by the Office of the Pro-Vice Chancellor: Academic and Research at the International University of Management (approval dated 26/3/2018), data was collected after researchers obtained fully informed verbal consent from participants. Data was collected through four face-to-face focus group discussions that lasted for 30 to 45 minutes each. The reason for four focus group discussions was to get a deep understanding of the issues under investigation. Group discussions were considered particularly appropriate when the interviewer had to use a series of open ended questions and wished to encourage research participants to explore the issues of importance to them, in their own vocabulary, generating their own questions and pursuing their own priorities (Kitzinger, 1995). Semi-structured questioning was followed, this means that although the interviewers prepared a number of questions well in advance, (e.g., what do you consider as good teaching? What makes a good teacher? Depending on the answer, why do you consider those as good teaching practices?) Semi-structured interviews unfold in a conversational manner, offering participants the chance to explore issues that they feel are important (Longhurst, 2009)) under the research topic. All focus group discussions were tape recorded with the permission of the participants. The anonymity of participants in the focus groups is protected in this paper  and, in some instances, the use of "they" or "their" as the first person singular pronouns have been chosen to further protect the identity of participants and to illustrate how their statements have been representative of many focus group participants.
The study was conducted at the end of the academic year between November and December 2019.
The researchers encouraged the participants to talk freely about what they perceived to be good teaching, based on their experience as students at IUM. Excerpts from discussions have been provided in the results section of this paper.

Data analysis
The method of analysis in this research project involved both deductive and inductive logic to analyse the data. This means that while the researchers started off with observations from the literature or certain thematic categories from the literature (e.g., from Goepel, 2012;French, 2005;;Losoncz, 2009) they were also open to emergent themes or codes in the focus group discussions that could shed light on the phenomenon under investigation. To support the analysis, the software ATLAS.Ti was used. For a computer assisted analysis, Friese suggests the use of the NCT approach-Noticing things, Collecting things and Thinking about things (Friese, 2014). Using the NCT method of analysis enabled the researchers to conduct a systematic analysis. The main aim was to put all the findings together and gain a coherent understanding of the phenomenon (Friese, 2014). The following was done to analyse the data.
Focus group interview tape-recordings were transcribed and the ensuing transcriptions went through several phases of analysis. Each focus group's transcribed pages consisted of 5-6 pages typed pages. As part of the methodology, the researchers initially read the data several times to comprehend the content of the views held by students about good teaching. Secondly, the researchers coded the data into segments. This process involves moving forward and back through the transcripts, drawing on in-depth knowledge connected with the study, returning to the study question, and thinking in terms of systems and theoretical concepts. The third step involved marking relevant codes for further analysis in order to create categories. Fourthly, the researchers classified the coded data into predominant themes that explains students' conceptions of good teaching. The categories/themes that emerged from this study were: knowledge of subject and teaching skills, personality traits of the instructor and professional/instructional qualities. The relationship between the themes is that they all emanated from codes e.g., punctual teacher (as a code) was found to have a relation with the theme "professional qualities that explain the phenomenon of good teaching observed in the study". In the results section, illustrative comments (quotations) have been presented in the form of quotes for the various themes in order to provide a sense of what students' views were.

Criteria for judging the quality of the research
According to Yin (2009), there are certain criteria to consider in judging the quality of the research. These are validity and reliability. Qualitative credibility is achieved through various practices including thick description (Tracy, 2010)This study has provided a thick description of the data, including excerpts from interviews. For external validity, the results from this study may not only be generalised to the relevant framework used in carrying out the study, but also to other similar settings given the deductive and inductive approaches that were used. The reliability of the data for this study is solely attributable to the answers given by the interviewees. The procedures used in carrying out the study were documented to allow data collection and analysis by another researcher who might be interested to conduct a similar study.

Results
All the students were enrolled in undergraduate degrees and they were all between the ages of 20-30. Codes generated from students' responses were grouped together into categories and themes (emanating both from the literature and data collected), depending on the link between the categories and why those categories were considered important in order to generate themes (see, Green et al., 2007). From the analysis, three themes emerged as follows: (1) Professional qualities, (2) Subject knowledge and (3) Personality traits.
These themes are similar to Aristotle's framework on practical wisdom were he says wisdom comes about through professional practice knowledge = professional qualities, epitsteme = subject knowledge and personality traits = phronesis (Massingham, 2019). Aristotle argues that practical wisdom is the highest intellectual virtue (Massingham, 2019).
The following section expands these themes through providing quotations from the research field discussions. The purpose of the quotations listed under the themes is that quotations provides a link to what we know about people in other settings through the themes developed (Green et al., 2007).

Professional qualities
Professionals progress from novice to master in the course of practising their craft. This requires deconstructing professional practice. The theory of professional practice makes overt distinctions between technical and practical knowledge (Massingham, 2019). Professional qualities are concerned with matters beyond the requirements of subject knowledge or technical competence (Massingham, 2019). Professional attributes in teachers or lecturers include the establishing of "fair, respectful, trusting, supportive and constructive relationships"; demonstrating "positive values, attitudes and behaviour"; commitment to effective communication, and respect for the contribution of others. These attributes, generally, are to be met by teachers required to "listen, build empathy, consult and negotiate effectively", "demonstrate sensitivity", "resolve conflicts and problems", "build confidence and self-esteem", and "use appropriate verbal and nonverbal communication" (Goepel, 2012, p. 497).
In this study, the professional qualities included: availability of lecturers to assist students outside classroom hours; to communicate clearly; to provide enough time to study and do assignments; to be punctual; to make content accessible; to not give free marks; and to use simple (comprehensible) language. The following quotes demonstrate these qualities: "A good lecturer is prepared in such a way that he or she comes on time" (P4: 28:28) . 1 "Make things straight forward, doesn't use too much difficult vocabulary like heavy words that students can't understand" (P2, 9:9).
The vocabulary challenge could be linked to the issue of language in Namibia where 70% of teachers in high school struggle with the language and results in underachievement of Grade 12 leaners in English (Kamati & Woldemariam, 2016). Learners therefore do struggle with language when they move to university. According to Chickering and Gamson , (1987)allocating realistic amounts of time to students when teaching means effective learning for students and effective teaching for the faculty.
Professional qualities were also described by students as one where the lecturer is creative, ready for class presentations, and provides scope for examination.
When a teacher comes to class and the learners are excited to be in that class and not only feeling like "Oh, it's a drag. It's another day in this class again." As a lecturer, you are supposed to be able to know that even if I come to class tomorrow, I will expect a full class and not a class of children skipping lessons or coming to class but deciding to rather sleep in the class. You need to make sure that the lesson is always interesting and that's where creativity come(s) in. Just to be always ready for your class presentations, not just come there and read from the pre-prepared slides because a lot of lecturers do that. They come to class, they read and sometimes they also figure out that, "Oh, I made mistakes on the slide." You don't even know what you are talking about and you are just coming to class just for the sake of "I was here" and not because you really want to be here or you want to teach us what you intended to teach us. Also, a lecturer should give us a scope so we know that we don't need to over-study or under-study (P1, 28:28).
From experience, when a subject that is taught by more than one lecturer, providing a scope for examination can be a challenge at times as different teachers have different beliefs on whether a scope for examination should be given to students. There are those who believe that giving students a scope for examination limits students' learning and there are those who believe that giving scope allows students to focus on the important information during exams thus making learning easy for them. This means that a lecturer who finds him or herself teaching a subject with someone who does not believe in giving students a scope for the examination may end not giving scope to avoid conflict between different groups of students taught by these lecturers and clashes between lecturers.
Other students felt good lecturers create excitement. One student explained this in the following way:

Okay the best lecturer that I ever had was the funny moments, the jokes the lecturer was making, making you laugh and wake up in class if you were feeling sleepy. Is bringing your attention, giving good examples and making things straight forward, clear -very clear that you don't even need to go back to your books (P2, 57:57).
For a country like Namibia that has a relatively young population, one would find young lecturers in universities and these are generally known to be serious and do not have time for jokes with students compared to older lecturers as young lecturers fear that students will take advantage of them.
Lastly, under the theme of professional and instructional qualities, one student indicated that good teachers are the ones who do not give free marks. This is consistent with the findings by Centra (2005); Linse (2017) and Abrami (2001) who alluded to the belief that teachers who try to increase their scores by boosting grades are unlikely to fool students. Faculty members who try to manipulate students' ratings by giving free high marks are at risk of receiving low ratings from students who worked hard in the course and who turned in "A" work. Centra (2005) argued that teachers will not improve their evaluations by giving higher grades and less coursework. They will improve their evaluations and their instruction if they respond to consistent student feedback about instructional practices. In Namibia, there have been reports and allegations in the local media that some lecturers have been awarding students extra or higher marks in return of sexual favours (The Namibian, 2011).

Knowledge of subject content and teaching skills
Subject knowledge and teaching skills embrace depth of understanding, and subject related pedagogical knowledge, as well as content knowledge at an appropriate level (French, 2005). In organisation studies, episteme equals subject knowledge, which is about professional practice knowledge and practice is "doing, knowing, being, and becoming" (Higgs, 2012, p. 75 as cited in Massingham, 2019. A professional is distinguished by "the capacity to make sound judgements in the absence of certainty" (Massingham, 2019, p. 2). In this paper, we assume subject knowledge to be knowledge or sound judgements about the subject matter in education and management science subjects at tertiary level. Teaching skills refers to developing and extending the type of decisions a teacher makes about their own teaching and the successful execution of those decisions. Important elements of teaching skills are: a) knowledge about the subject, b) decision making which occurs during and after a lesson concerning how best to achieve the educational outcomes and c) action which comprises the overt behaviour undertaken to foster student learning (Kyriacou, 1998).
The subject knowledge described by students in this study were: teachers ensuring that students understand the content, teachers who conduct research about the subject; contextualise issues being taught, have the best interest of students; interact with students and make subject content accessible to students.
The following quote illustrates these conceptions: A teacher comes into the classroom well-prepared and presents the lesson and before proceeding, makes sure that a particular topic or that section has been understood by all the students, and then pose(s) questions before moving forward . . . because now, most of the time, lecturers would just move forward, present everything and then there's a topic inbetween that the students didn't understand. So now when the time comes to ask questions, you have to go all the way back again, which is now delaying and is wasting a lot of time. So, if you can present a topic, then you ask "do you understand? Are there any questions before you proceed?" Then I think that is a very productive lesson (P1; 27:27).
Another practice that students felt makes for a good teacher was the ability of a lecturer to conduct research and prepare for class well in advance. This is consistent with the findings by Bain (2004) that good teachers do research, have important and original thoughts on their subjects, and study carefully and extensively what other people have done and are doing in their fields. The quote below illustrates: I believe that a good teacher or good lecturer, is someone who is able to research, to know the content of what they are going to teach and not just memorise everything but when they go there they make sure that they themselves understand the information before they can present the information to the people they are trying to teach (P1, 20:20).
The preceding quote/finding defeat the purpose of Vision 2030 to achieve an education system that has students with flexible enquiring minds and critical thinking skills, capable of adapting to new situations and demands and continuously learning from own initiative. If the teachers themselves do not understand what they are teaching, there is no way Namibia can ever reach its goals of Vision 2030.
One student described good teaching as teaching wherein students are able to contextualize issues in order to ensure understanding: I believe the most effective thing will be to convert content to everyday issues. To things that we experience in our daily lives. For instance, you cannot just come there with your complex vocabulary, we might not get it! You can start off with that and then you say like "as some of you might have noticed in your environment, this and this happened, it's the same as this and this and so forth". It should actually be something that we can relate to then we will all understand (P2, 75:75). This is in line with Scott (2015) who alluded that as societies become more knowledge-based, schools including higher education institutions must evolve to ensure the information and skills needs of students. The key focus of twenty-first century learning is adaptation to keep pace with demand and expectations on the ground (Scott, 2015).

Personality traits
According to Losoncz (2009, p. 169), personality traits are "relatively stable, cross-situational tendencies that refer to the abstract underlying characteristics of individuals". Further, good personalities refer to a teacher who is adaptable, organized, creative and humorous and empathetic (Ministry of Education, Guyana, 2017). Aristotle equated personality traits to phronesis, which refers to how one acts. For Aristotle, practical knowledge and moral virtues go together: it is impossible to be practically wise without being good (Massingham, 2019, p. 3).
The personality traits of a good lecturer identified by students in this study are: patience, understanding; friendly; warm-hearted; and being confident. Bain (2004) found that personality played little or no role in successful teaching in the United States. For many young lecturers who are commencing their teaching careers and are faced with overcrowded classrooms, it can be difficult to have confidence during the early days given different students from different backgrounds who at times are ill-disciplined and would say anything they want to say to a lecturer. Confidence is something that builds up over-time. However, when it comes to taking time to understand students, two students described the following regarding the issue of understanding: What makes someone a good lecturer, I think it is when you have that understanding between the lecturer and the student, when I am comfortable with going to my lecturer and telling him or her that this is the situation I am in. Can you or, will you be able to assist me? and the lecturer actually goes out of his or her way to assist. I believe that is someone you can depend on as a good lecturer (P2, 10:10).
She listens to students' reasons. Sometimes lecturers are very rude and no matter how hard a student tries to explain or give a reason for, missing an assessment, some just don't listen at all (P1, 73:73).
The issue of rude teachers confesses that there is room for improvement. The nature of the teaching profession requires engaging with the students, teachers are expected to be friendly and patient with students in order to make it easy for students to approach them in case students need further information or assistance. As a teacher, one needs to know not only the subject knowledge but also how to reach a student's heart.
Lastly, because some students are slow learners, students felt that good teachers should be patient. The following quote illustrate. .
A teacher/lecturer also needs to be patient because some students really don't understand what is taught. I mean we are not the same. Some don't comprehend the things that are taught quickly so teachers must be patient with such students. Some students ask a lot of questions so teachers ought to be patient even if such students ask a lot of times. Patience also matters (P2, 73:73). Using the data obtained from the field, in Table 3 we sum up the results as per the teacher-centred and student centred conceptions of teaching.

Discussion of results
The aim of the study was to identify conceptions of good teaching from the students' perspective in higher education institutions. From the teaching approaches discussed, it is clear that students regard teachers who are student-centred as good teachers. The data presented under the results section has revealed a set of themes that closely resonate with the list of attributes characteristic of good teaching that were identified in the literature review made by the researchers. For example, students' conceptions of lecturers who focus only on what's important when teaching is similar to the sub-themes that emerged from the participants' stories in Ballantyne et al., 1999); establishing good relations with students is similar to what was found by Dunkin and Precians (1992); Ladson-Billings (1995) and provision of content to students resonates with Kember et al.'s (2004) findings on the characteristics of good teachers according to students' conceptions. Although the findings from this paper may not be unique from the existing literature, the implication of the absence of unique insights is that methods of instruction and administration continue to be modified to reach students' hearts (Dewey, 1916). This will require teachers to step out of their comfort zones otherwise students will find alternatives in other countries where effort is made to improve teaching. Perhaps reading and familiarisation with existing literature on good teaching is what needs to be emphasized on during student teachers' training.
The importance of teachers in ensuring that students understand what is being taught was a central theme in the interview responses. This is in consonance with Bain (2004, p. 25) who wrote that "the best teachers know how to simplify and clarify complex subjects, to cut to the heart of the matter with provocative insights, and they can think about their own thinking in the discipline, analysing its nature and evaluating its quality". Further, Even (1990) posited that a teacher who has solid subject knowledge for teaching is more capable of helping his/her students achieve a meaningful understanding of the subject matter. However, the subject knowledge and impact on student outcomes seem to apply only in some fields. The literature surveyed indicated that teacher content knowledge is estimated to have no significant effect on student outcomes when it comes to mathematics (Shepherd, (2015).
Apart from subject knowledge, this research found that handouts and other learning resources were appreciated by students and promoted good teaching. In Namibia most students are from poor families and not many of them have bursaries or access to loans. Buying textbooks prescribed by lecturers is therefore not easy. Students therefore prefer copies of learning materials from the lecturer e.g., power point slides to ease learning. Even for those who are not from poor families, they would still want learning materials from lecturers in addition to the prescribed textbooks. This is what responsive pedagogy is all about.
From personal experience of authors, responsive pedagogy's implementation in Namibian higher education institutions depends on the lecturer. There are lecturers who believe that providing handouts to students will make them lazy in a sense that they will not go out and read more materials than what they are given in class. There are those who believe that providing handouts is important as it provides a foundation for students on where to begin as they search for more materials on their own. Nevertheless, a study carried out in Australia by Ramsden et al. (1995), found that good teachers are those who are aware and responsive to their students' needs (Smith et al., 2016). Kember and McNaught (2007) proposed ten principles of good teaching and pointed to engagement of students in learning as one of those principles. Similarly, in Duarte's (2013) findings, one of the good teachers interviewed described good teaching as "rather than focusing on the more scholarly insights of negotiation strategies, it would be more fruitful to immerse her students in the process of negotiation, through situating course materials into the broader context of work-related structures and issues" (Duarte, 2013). In Namibia where there are not so many opportunities for students to do internship and when they do find internships they face logistical challenges such as accommodation and transport (Shaketange et al., 2017), situating course materials into the broader context of work structures becomes very important in the classroom. It is important for lecturers to provide real-life experiences and the skills students need to learn before they graduate and before they start working as well as expose students to what is happening in the real world by providing real examples from course materials or providing activities for students to complete e.g., writing skills in order to be fit for the job market. Excellent teachers influence students' desire to learn with appropriate subject knowledge and have a supportive relationship with students (Cho et al., 2018).
Our findings provide further evidence from students to support previous findings that a caring and positive classroom environment helps students to be motivated to learn (Lizzio et al., 2002) by having patience and not being rude.
Although students in this paper mainly pointed out issues which are mainly student-centred as good teaching which is in line with literature from developed countries (see for example, Alhija, 2017;Duarte, 2013), what was most interesting and unique compared to the literature from developed countries was the fact that students did not point out active learning e.g., cooperative learning and critical thinking as good teaching attributes as found by Cavanagh (2011) in Australia and Parpala et al. (2011) in Finland. This could be attributed to the fact that students have been oriented to passive learning (which is not encouraged under the studentcentred approach) or teachers themselves were not exposed to critical thinking during the time that they were students and along their teaching careers. Therefore, they do not do it in class and students do not know about it. This is a threat to achieving Vision 2030. Stuart and Thurlow (2000) orated that teachers act as they do (given their experiences and resulting beliefs), because it makes sense for them to do so and they carry on with it throughout their teaching careers at higher education institutions. For example, a recent study in Namibia by Hautemo (2016) found that at primary school level there are still teachers who just use group work which does not lead to any effective improvement in learner's knowledge. In these groups, learners are given little or no time to communicate and thus the classroom activities are often teacher-centred rather than being executed by students themselves through meaningful and properly designed social interaction. Henard and Leprince-Ringuet (2008) alluded to the notion that the choice of indicators to measure quality teaching is crucial and how the teacher is judged by students will undoubtedly impact his or her teaching methods, active learning is a must in creating a deep scholarship. Active learning should be seen as an essential approach to good teaching in higher education given the demands placed on students during their student careers, the workplace, and in the broader sense of life. Facilitating active learning can yield many positive results in student performance, and can usually be seen in a short period of time. It is important for teachers to set the tone for student learning as early as possible in a class, bridge the student-instructor divide, and empower students with a sense of agency over their own learning (Romaniuk, 2018). This means that students should not only view good teaching as the sole responsibility of the teacher, but it should also involve active engagement by the students. This is important if Namibia is to achieve Vision 2030 of having students who are critical thinkers.

Conclusion
The study sought to explore Namibian students' conceptions of good teaching. Students pointed out a number of factors that contribute to what they regard as good teaching. From the results, there is evidence that students consider different aspects of teaching to describe good teaching but their preference is for those teachers who are student-centred. The results from this study are indicative of the fact that teaching encompasses more than just teachers' thoughts and beliefs about what is good teaching. Good teaching entails that good teachers move out of their comfort zones by not only doing what they think is enough or comfortable for them but also go the extra mile for students. This according to students could be done by for example, by teachers explaining in detail the content of what they teach, create extra time for students' questions in order to ensure students understand the content of the subjects. Good teaching requires that teachers be more understanding towards students, be punctual and guide students to needed learning resources. This will require training. Through this training, Vygotsky (1978) argues that learning be viewed as a profoundly social process, emphasizes dialogue and the varied roles that language plays in instruction and in mediated cognitive growth. He argues that the simple exposure of students to new materials through oral lectures allows neither for guidance nor for collaboration with peers. To ensure that students understand the content of subjects is to implement the concept of the zone of proximal development in instruction, psychologists and educators must collaborate in the analysis of the internal ("subtefranean") developmental processes which are stimulated by teaching and which are needed for subsequent learning. This means that teaching represents the means through which development is advanced; that is, the socially elaborated contents of human knowledge and the cognitive strategies necessary for their internalization are evoked in the learners-according to their "actual developmental levels." Vygotsky therefore criticizes educational intervention that lags behind developed psychological processes instead of focusing upon emerging functions and capabilities (Vygotsky, 1978). The results in the paper have implications, for universities to invest in staff development by providing training to lecturers on how to teach effectively in higher education institutions. The study also has implications for allocation of subjects to lecturers who have knowledge of that particular subject. This will also boost confidence of the lecturers. This paper is expected to contribute to better conceptualisation of good teaching as the authors have primarily used real-life data, following gaps found in previous literature. The research constitutes a more comprehensive study which included interviews with students. The interviews enabled an in-depth exploration of the students' views on what good teaching is. The hints provided by students have potential as valuable resources for teachers, especially those beginning their teaching careers. We conclude that, good teaching matters a lot but this understanding should not only be imbued in teachers but among students.

Limitations and suggestions for further research
In acknowledging the limitations of the study, we note that the first is the small size of the sample. A larger group of students, perhaps from various disciplines or universities, would have generated richer data, not only with a greater variety of views and themes, but also with the opportunity for comparative analysis between the different student groups. Secondly, as in Duarte's research (Duarte, 2013), the study focused solely on what students regard as good teaching. As much as students have suggested what they regard as good teaching, the complexity of the teaching learning process and the unpredictable nature of classroom dynamics often hinder good teaching (Bustos-Orosa, 2008). This paper did not consider a more critical analysis of factors that may hinder "good teaching". Thirdly, the study was general and not topic-specific as it did not focus on a particular subject.
Areas for future research should include using this type of data to formulate a survey that can be given to a large number of students. Future studies should further refine specific teaching as aspects of that are most critical to students' conceptions of good teaching.

Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Authors' statements
The paper is written by young academics who have recently started their teaching careers but were keen to get views from students in Namibia on what they consider as good teaching as most of the current literature only focuses on teachers' views. Most of the literature on this topic is from the developed nations and the findings from these nations may not necessarily be applicable to African countries given its unique challenges. It is argued that educators need not only to be skilled but be passionate about what they do. After all, they're responsible for guiding students and their development.