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From this statement two important issues become evident, particularly for this study, firstly, , this student was of the opinion that her own tutor, unlike other tutors, did not allow her students to produce initial drafts where they could be guided on their errors and omissions and how to improve the essay as a final draft.\ Notably, this student made reference to other tutorial groups where tutors resolved students‟ problems in the first draft and have the assignments handed in as the second draft. This reinforces the notion of chain-process in writing development. Neville (1996) states that one of the challenges that students face in relation to writing is their understanding of writing as a final draft. He argues that teaching students the process of writing exposes them to the nature and complexity of academic writing. In this regard he illustrates that
“an average academic working on an item to be published is likely to produce three or four drafts and often asks colleagues to comment on what has been written” (Neville, 1996, p.40). Contrary to Neville‟s view that the process of writing should b taught, Gee (1996) is of the opinion that academic writing cannot be taught explicitly (through overt instruction), but can only be learnt through the process of apprenticeship (see chapter two, section 2.8.4). The reason being that apprenticeship allows students to see for themselves the processes involved in writing development.
Summarily, it appears that the student participants all perceived that their tutors and lecturers are competent, but that they are not united in the kind of instruction they gave students in the tutorials and lectures. Consequently, students were taught differently in the tutorials and are expected to write the same during assessments. Closely related to these differences in lesson delivery, students have also described tutors‟ written feedback within the ALUGS module as incomprehensible as they are written in language not understood by students. AL practitioners also have their own perceptions about the ALUGS module to that of the students.
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described by these students as confusing and unsatisfactory due to tutors‟ inability to teach the same thing in their tutorials. The discussions thus far have revolved around the students‟
perceptions of the module, tutors and lecturers. Tutors and lecturers were interviewed to establish a balance in the individual participant‟s perception of the module and other social members in the teaching and learning of the module. According to one of the tutors, Mrs Zumbo, students seemed to have developed a fear for the ALUGS module due the impression they might have received from other students who probably might have experienced certain difficulty in their engagement with the module. The tutor stated that:
“…in terms of AL, I think my students were under the impression that AL is a very difficult module. So as they were coming to class most of them didn‟t even want to participate because they assume that the moment they put their hands up I‟m just gonna say that the answer is wrong or something of that. As a result they were not willing to participate; they were just shy and they were ready to receive whatever knowledge I was giving them which means there was a myth that needed to be banked or to be clarified it terms of AL (Mrs Zumbo).
It is revealed in this statement that students are afraid to contribute anything in the tutorials because of the type of information they received even before registering for the module. In the university under study, every student believes that the ALUGS module is difficult to pass. This was one of the rationales for embarking on this research to explore how the module is being taught, and the impact that the teaching practices have on the students‟ writing practices.
It appears that the way writing is being taught within the module, positioned the students to be at a disadvantage e, and consequently they see themselves to be passive in the teaching-learning process, that is, students were constructed as passive recipients of knowledge. The tutor said that
“they were ready to receive whatever knowledge I was giving them”. This therefore reinforces the notion that students should be viewed as tabula rasa or empty beings (Bengesai, 2012), who only wait to be filled with academic writing skills. From this perspective, there is a flawed notion that a student‟s mind is empty and that it is the duty of lecturers and tutors to fill that emptiness with writing skills (Freire, 2008; Bengesai, 2012). In agreement with this, another tutor, Mrs Rak, while describing her own students, stated that: “…some of them came without knowing how to write” (Mrs Rak).
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It seems that students have been constructed as being ignorant of the knowledge of writing, particularly academic writing. In this way, the AL practitioners seem to have constructed students within the ALUGS module as being under-prepared for academic writing. However, Mrs Rak emphasized that it is only some of them who came into the system without knowing how to write. This therefore reveals that students come into the system with differences; some have mastered writing as a literacy practice, while the others have not. The question then, is how are these differences attended to within the ALUGS module? A lecturer participant, Mrs Sets, added that despite the differences among these students, they were randomly placed in tutorial groups. She emphasized that there was no provision for diagnostic tests to determine the type of provision each student needs for academic development. She stated: “It is completely random”.
To reinforce why it was randomly being done, Mr Tina, another lecturer participant stated that:
“ they are just grouped together- there is no placement... in terms of (eeh) placing them in terms of their abilities; in relation to their abilities and their… you know also that for me placing them into different abilities would also create a gap that would not, would never be filled. You know, in the sense that those who are perceived as not able you know you will be always in that position and those who are perceived as able in other words there would be always this difference, you know among students...”(Mr Tina).
The excerpt above informs the present study that AL practitioners were aware that students had differences in academic performances, but the notion that placing students into tutorial groups according to their abilities may serve as a means to naturalize such differences in the classroom.
Mrs Sets then added that the majority of the students lack the necessary skills that ought to make them cope with the demands of academic life. She stated that:
“We just found that people did not have those skills in order to the critical thinking, critical reading and critical writing skills in order to cope with the demands of academic life and academic literacy was introduced and became compulsory” (Mrs Sets).
This yet again reinforces the fact that students were perceived as being under-prepared for tertiary literacy. However, this under-preparedness seems to be associated with the lack of
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necessary skills such as critical thinking, critical reading and critical writing skills deemed important in coping with academic demands. Mrs Sets further confirmed that this lack is linked to the second language users of English. She states that:
“We were having a lot of second language people coming through the system and the schools were changing, it was a tough change and the nature of schooling in South Africa was changing” (Mrs. Sets).
From this lecturer‟s perspective, the ALUGS module seems to have been designed primarily for the second language students because of their lack of those skills that are deemed indispensable for academic success at the university. This therefore reveals that the focus of the module was on equipping students, particularly ESL students, with writing skills. It appears that students who do not have such skills within the ALUGS module are constructed as deficit, thus placing the module to follow after the autonomous model of literacy. Within this model, emphasis is on skill acquisition rather than learning through social interaction (see Street, 2003, chapter two, section 2.8.2).
This therefore reveals that academic writing within this module is taught and perceived as a technology of the mind (Street, 2003), an entity that rests solely within an individual‟s brain devoid of cultural and social realities in which learning is embedded. In essence, it is what you either have in your brain or you do not have. It is the fear of not having such skills as described by the tutor that made students perceive academic literacy as being difficult, thus rendering them inactive and non-participatory in tutorials.