BACKGROUND AND RATIONALE FOR STUDY
5.6 How the theory informs the method in this study
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It is from this understanding of literacy that this study seeks to understand if (and how) the students in the FP are socialized into their science disciplines. One of the ways to establish this was through the use of semi-structured interviews. This research instrument was used to understand ways in which the FP students are apprenticed into the discourse community of science; and to ascertain whether the DSs who teach the science modules offered in the FP assist the FP students to acquire an identity in science. This study explored the type/s of academic reading and writing needed in the foundation modules in science; how students coped with the academic discourse of scientific texts; and writing science.
According to Collins (2000), the field of NLS (Street, 1985) shares with Bernstein (1971) and Bourdieu (1977) a political and sociological conception of the relations between language, identity, and institutional orders (70). The necessity of understanding the reliance of secondary discourse in reading, writing, and speaking science discourse is linked to Bourdieu’s (1977) ‘cultural capital’ which is explained as familiarity with the dominant culture in a society, and more especially, in this study, the ability to understand and use 'educated' language as per the dictates of the foundation modules of science offered in the FP. This was explored in this study by means of observation and documentary evidence;
data from which has been corroborated with the verbal responses to questions posed to the RPs in the semi-structured interviews. The ‘cultural capital’ needs to be seen in light of institutional expectation – the ability to understand and communicate in the LoLT, English, the ‘educated language’ (Bourdieu, 1977) used in the research site. Since science texts rely on the ‘elaborated code’ (Bernstein, 1971) to convey science knowledge, the study shows whether this type of code has any impact on the FP students’ use of the language of science in the foundation modules offered in the FP.
The language of science uses two kinds of resources to convey knowledge – lexical and grammatical. The lexical resource includes technical terms (for science has its own specific register); and grammatical resources include nominalization (which includes complex nominal phrases, nominal compounds and grammatical metaphors); and lexical density. By way of access to documentary evidence in the form of course manuals, this study explored the way in which the FP students engaged with these specific resources. This study also focuses on Grammatical Metaphor (GM) (Halliday and Martin, 1993). This study shows how GM functions in terms of presenting processes as things and the packaging of complex phenomena in texts. Understanding how GM functions in science is one of the directions
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of this study which is undertaken through access to documentary evidence in the form of course manuals. Halliday (1978; 1985a) considers nominalization from a systemic functional perspective and proposes the idea of GM. His systemic theory is a theory of meaning as choice, by which a language is interpreted as networks of interlocking options.
In this study, the SFL (Halliday 1978; 1985a) model of language was used to explain how language works within the context of science; i.e. to understand the relationship between language and context. The focus on the relationship between language and the context means that the theory can account for language variation across different registers and across the different genres that students need to speak, listen to, read or write. It treats language at the level of text rather than simply at the level of sentence. SFL is functional because it is designed to account for how language is used and the way it is organised to fulfil communicative functions. It was from this point that this study explored the way in which language was used in science. This was ascertained by means of observation and the responses from the semi-structured interviews. This involved an understanding of the nature of the communicative activity/event that was taking place (i.e. the field) (e.g. a science practical); the social roles of the interactants in the communicative activity/event (i.e. the tenor) (e.g. the interactive relationship between the DS who teaches foundation biology and a group of students in the FP); and the role of language in the communicative activity/event (i.e. the mode) (e.g. making sense of a science text by way of reading, discussion, diagrams/visuals).
This study used SFL to understand the lexicogrammatical choices needed to write science.
Scientific language has specific grammar and relies on specialized register to communicate science knowledge and differs from the way in which language is used in everyday casual conversation or spontaneous speech. This study relied on documentary evidence to understand how the students in the FP engaged with the language of science, especially the technical, abstract, dense and impersonal ways that characterise science writing/reading.
This study, through the research instrument of documentary evidence, explored the ways in which the students in the FP were able to engage and/or cope with the unique linguistic forms and structures that construct and communicate scientific principles, knowledge, and beliefs.
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Genres have been described as “socially recognised ways of using language for particular purposes within particular contexts” (Hyland, 2003: 21). Genre links language, purpose and context. The relationship between language and context is seen in the way language is used, with genres being the configuration of what texts are about - which explains what is going on; who is involved; and, demonstrates the role language plays in such texts. This genre perspective to language enabled the study to understand the genres needed in science, the linguistic resources used to express meaning in context, which, in this study, is scientific knowledge/meaning in the context of the modules offered in the FP. As shown by the data analysis this study revealed whether the DSs who teach the foundation modules in science made any effort to make explicit what was to be learnt, understood and practised in scientific genres. In terms of the advantages of genres, this study offered an understanding concerning the extent to which research participants were explicit about what was needed in science genres to help students respond to texts – the content from which they would need to construct genres, to be able to learn and acquire acceptable writing strategies required in science. This is also related to ways in which the FP students are apprenticed into acquiring the discourse applicable to genres; and if the DSs made any attempt to scaffold students’ learning of the genres in science by addressing the structure and language of the genre. Semi-structured interviews and documentary evidence were helpful to understand these dynamics.
The research instrument of observation was used to explore if Vygotsky’s (1978b) pedagogical approach of interactive collaboration between the learner (who, in the context of this study, is the FP student) and the’ teacher’ (i.e. the DSs and/or the ALs in the context of this study), where the latter helps to support or scaffold the former’s learning does take place in the context of the FP in science; and if so, the way/s in which this is facilitated.
Scaffolding, as a supported teaching/learning strategy, helps the learner to move towards his/her potential level of learning. Documentary evidence, i.e. the discipline-based course manuals were used to find out if any of the reading texts with which the FP students had engaged, were scaffolded. Scaffolding, in the context of this study, referred to assistance provided by the RPs to the FP students with regard to classroom tasks/exercises, reading and writing. Research findings from this study illustrated whether there was any evidence of the RPs using the strategies of micro/macro scaffolding; modelling; providing guided practice; and/or the contextualization, deconstruction, analysis, discussion and joint negotiation of text/s to “help bridge the gap between what [the learner] know[s] and can do
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and what [he or she] need[s] to accomplish in order to succeed at a particular learning task”
(Graves and Braaten, 1996: 169).