The present study aims at investigating some aspects involved in teaching English reading through authentic texts, in a public high school, based on my experience as a teacher in such context. The paper, of ethnographic basis, will also consider theoretical postulates in relation to the authenticity of English texts, as well as in relation to the reading theories and to the English for Specific Purposes approach. The authenticity issue in the language classroom is a complex theme, even more so if we discuss the concept of "authentic". This paper, a selfanalysis, aims at carefully studying this concept and the use of such material in reading development in language learning. The research instruments include recordings of classes in video tape, the teacher-researcher s field notes, learners notes, interviews with learners and questionnaires. Data analysis, as it was triangulated, suggests that, according to students as well as teacher-researcher s reactions, the use of authentic texts in the English reading class, considering some aspects of a need for choosing the theme and negotiating meanings at the time of the reading, may contribute to a more meaningful and realistic learning, in this more specific context. Therefore, considering that the teaching and learning process is also based on elements other than just classroom material itself, there are other essential factors to this process, such as critical and reflexive teacher education and his or her conceptions of reading, learners contributions, as well as the content of the proposed activities. / Esta pesquisa, de base etnográfica, visa a investigar alguns aspectos que envolvem o ensino de leitura em língua inglesa por meio de textos autênticos, na rede pública, partindo de minha experiência como docente neste contexto. Embasando o trabalho serão considerados postulados teóricos referentes à questão da autenticidade de textos em língua inglesa, bem como concepções teóricas de leitura e aspectos relacionados à abordagem instrumental no ensino de línguas. A autenticidade na sala de aula de línguas é um tema complexo, sobre tudo no que diz respeito à própria conceituação do termo "autêntico". Esta pesquisa, de autoanálise, objetiva, portanto, problematizar o conceito e analisar a utilização desse tipo de material no desenvolvimento da leitura no campo da aprendizagem de línguas. Os instrumentos de pesquisa do presente estudo compreendem gravações de aulas em vídeo, notas de campo da professora-pesquisadora, depoimentos dos aprendizes-participantes, questionários e entrevistas. A análise dos dados, triangulados, sugere, por meio das reações manifestadas pelos alunos e pela professora-pesquisadora, que a exploração de textos autênticos em aulas de leitura em língua inglesa, observados alguns aspectos como a análise de necessidades na escolha do tema e também a negociação de significados no momento da leitura, pode contribuir para um ensino mais significativo e coerente com a realidade dos aprendizes, nesse contexto específico. Assim, considerando que o processo de ensino e aprendizagem constitui-se de elementos outros que não apenas o material didático em si, fatores cruciais nesse processo são pressupostos, como a formação crítica e reflexiva do professor e suas concepções de leitura, as contribuições dos aprendizes, bem como o teor das atividades propostas. / Mestre em Lingüística

Cette étude en anglais de spécialité s’inscrit dans le domaine de la terminologie du discours des annonces pour l’emploi en milieu scientifique, domaine encore inexploré d’un point de vue linguistique. Le discours des annonces pour l’emploi est la somme de plusieurs discours, notamment discours des ressources humaines, discours publicitaire, discours qu’on peut appeler « touristique » et discours scientifique. Puisque le but primordial de l’annonce est de faire la publicité de l’entreprise ou du laboratoire de recherche, le discours scientifique y est réduit au minimum car il s’avère que ce discours ne peut se plier à la finalité et aux contraintes des annonceurs. Après une analyse des vocables des ressources humaines, un travail a été entrepris sur les domaines scientifiques concernés et une nouvelle terminologie a été proposée, articulée notamment autour de hyperdomaines, domaines et sous-domaines scientifiques. L’analyse des vocables scientifiques suggère une distinction nécessaire entre les vocables scientifiques et les termes spécialisés. Enfin, le travail se clôt par un examen des moyens linguistiques et graphiques mis en œuvre dans le discours publicitaire. / This dissertation focuses on English for Specific Purposes and more particularly on the terminology of scientific job advertisements discourse, an area still in pristine condition from a linguistic point of view. Job advertisements discourse is the sum of various discourses, i.e. human resources, advertising as well as a discourse which may be termed as "tourist" discourse and scientific discourse. Since the main purpose of advertisements is to advertise the company or the research laboratory, science discourse is minimized because it appears that this particular discourse fails to comply with the announcers’ ultimate aim. Once an analysis of human resources terms was done, a study was undertaken on scientific fields and a new terminology has been suggested, namely that of scientific hyperfields, fields and sub-fields. The analysis of scientific terms calls for a necessary distinction that has to be made between scientific terms and specialized terms. At last, the dissertation undertakes an analysis of linguistic and graphic means used in the advertising discourse.

Cette thèse essaie d’établir un lien entre les supports utilisés dans l’enseignement/apprentissage de l’anglais de spécialité et les chances d’une appropriation effective par les apprenants. Basée sur le concept d’apprenabilité/enseignabilité de Pienemann et celui de zone proximale de développement(ZPD) de Vygotsky entre autres, cette recherche-action a permis de découvrir que les documents authentiques sont généralement d’un accès très difficile pour les apprenants, et que les documents fabriqués sont généralement plus accessibles mais requièrent des tâches à consignes claires et sans ambiguïté pour constituer de l’input compréhensible et permettre qu’il y ait réellement apprentissage. Toutefois, les apprenants censés être des experts dans le domaine de spécialité ne le sont souvent pas, et dans un tel environnement, où parfois ni l’enseignant, ni les apprenants, ne sont experts dans le domaine de spécialité, et où les résultats attendus sont généralement au-delà de la ZPD des apprenants, même avec des documents fabriqués accompagnés de tâches appropriées, l’enseignement de l’anglais de spécialité ne peut se faire avec beaucoup de succès. Dans ces conditions, faire travailler les apprenants, en autonomie ne suffit pas pour garantir la réussite de l’apprentissage. D’où la nécessité, non seulement de revoir le contenu des enseignements et de les faire cadrer véritablement avec les connaissances des apprenants dans la (les) matières(s) de spécialité, mais aussi de permettre aux enseignants de s’approprier le concept de la nécessaire autonomisation des apprenants, pour en faire un concept partagé de tous, et pour que les apprenants se mettent effectivement à apprendre. / The aim of this thesis is to show the relationship between the documents that are used in the teaching/learning of English for specific purposes and the possibility of learners to actually achieve learning. Based on the concepts of learnability/teachability of Pienemann and of Zone of Proximal Development of Vygotsky among others, this action research has led to the finding that learners find it much more difficult to understand authentic texts than pedagogic ones but the latter require tasks with very clear instructions to become understandable input. However, in an environment where learners who are supposed to be experts in their specific subjects are not, and where sometimes neither the teachers nor the learners are experts in the specific subjects, and expected results are often beyond the ZPD of students, even with non authentic texts and relevant tasks with clear instructions, one cannot be certain to teach successfully. In such contexts, independent learning is not enough to guarantee success. It is therefore necessary to revise and adapt learning contents to the knowledge of learners in their specific subjects, and also to make sure the conceptof independent learning is adopted by all teachers so as to actually enable students to begin learning.

<p>   </p> <p>Motivated by the lack of research that has explored the rhetorical structure of research articles in the humanities, this dissertation analyzes professional philosophical discourse using move-analysis as an approach. A corpus of 60 research articles was compiled from some of the leading philosophy journals. The articles were selected from three sub-disciplinary areas: (a) metaphysics and epistemology, (b) the history of philosophy, and (c) ethics. To analyze the articles, a move analysis codebook was developed, which identified the rhetorical functions (i.e., moves and steps) that different text segments played. The codebook was then applied to the entire research article structure of the 60 research articles. Linguistic features of certain functional units were also identified via corpus analysis techniques. The results of the study show that rhetorical structure of philosophical writing is distinctive compared to other fields and disciplines. On one hand, at the macro level, philosophical writing uses a problem-solution structure rather than the IMRD (intro-methods-results-discussion) structure, common in the social and natural sciences. At the move and step level, philosophical writing heavily relies on evaluation to critically analyze solutions to philosophical problems. Finally, the dissertation found systemic rhetorical functions that permeated the entire research article. Most notably, philosophers heavily qualify and outline their arguments throughout the text. </p> <p>  </p>

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Over the past years, there has been a consistent call from Government and industry for South African tertiary institutions to deliver more graduates in the fields of science and technology. This, however, is no mean feat for universities, as the pool of prospective candidates delivers very few students with the necessary academic literacy abilities, and very few students who passed mathematics and science at the right levels to succeed in science higher education. This puts tertiary institutions under mounting pressure to accept students who are under-prepared and to support these students appropriately. The plight of Open and Distance Learning (ODL) institutions like the University of South Africa (UNISA) is even more desperate, as they are often left with those students who are either unable to gain entrance into, or to afford the study fees of, residential universities. These students are often in greater need for face-to-face interaction than are their counterparts at residential universities, yet they generally receive very little of this. The intervention examined and critiqued in this study is an attempt at raising the academic literacy levels of first-year students at UNISA in the fields of science and technology by means of a 60-hour face-to-face workshop programme. As its foundation, it uses the principles of collaborative learning and authentic material design. It also treats academic literacy abilities as interdependent and holistic. This study starts with a broad overview of the context. This is followed by a review of the literature. This review focuses on concepts such as collaborative learning, academic literacy, English for academic purposes, English for specific purposes and English for science and technology. Thereafter, a needs analysis is done in which students’ Test for Academic Literacy Levels (TALL) pre-test results, as well as a sample of their assignments, are examined. In addition, the workshops in this intervention programme are analysed individually. To determine the effectiveness of the academic literacy intervention, students’ pre- and post-TALL results are scrutinised, and a feedback questionnaire filled in at the end of the year is analysed. Subsequently, recommendations are made as to how the workshop programme could be improved. Findings show that the academic literacy intervention did improve students’ academic literacy levels significantly, though the improvement is not enough to elevate students from being considered at-risk. However, with fine-tuning the existing programme, the possibility exists that students’ academic literacy levels might be further improved. This calls for a careful examination of the areas in which students’ performance did not improve significantly. Student feedback indicated a positive attitude towards the entire intervention programme, as well as a marked preference for collaborative learning and face-to-face interaction. In the redevelopment of the current workshop programme, such preferences would have to receive attention, so as to integrate students’ wants, together with what they lack and what they need, in subsequent interventions. In conclusion, the limitations of this study are discussed, and recommendations are made for future research, as the current study must be seen as only the beginning of a process of action research that could lead to a sustainable intervention programme in future. Copyright / Dissertation (MA)--University of Pretoria, 2009. / Unit for Academic Literacy / Afrikaans / unrestricted

The thesis focuses on the topic of language and content integration in ELT in a broad sense, i.e. it discusses not only CLIL but also other models of content-based teaching, viz. ESP (English for Specific Purposes), EAP (English for Academic Purposes), and EMI (English-medium Instruction). In the theoretical part of the thesis, these models are described as regards their history, typical features, teachers, learners, as well as benefits and negatives. The empirical part of the thesis explores the current practice of language and content integration at Czech general secondary schools ("grammar schools"). The research is based on case studies of five teachers who teach various courses belonging to this category. The preliminary research investigated what courses are currently being offered at grammar schools in Prague; they are mostly elective courses. Our research findings suggest that language and content integration in the form of elective courses is a rather common practice, although often unconscious. Teachers tend to act on the basis of their intuition rather than their knowledge of theory and practice of language and content integration. Generally, it seems that more emphasis is put on content than language in these lessons. Content-based English lessons may be beneficial for learners for...

Text in English / In a quest to identify best practices in teaching courses in English for Specific Purposes (ESP), this study investigated effective teaching of an online English module in an Open Distance Learning (ODL) environment. Although ODL is attractive to both students and lecturers, there are significant problems regarding how learning, teaching, interaction and assessment should be conducted in this context. The problems are exacerbated by the limited knowledge of using the online systems and constraints linked to time spent on tasks. The study adopted the qualitative research approach, using a case study design and data collected from three research instruments, namely online questionnaires, an online observation schedule and a content analysis schedule. The research population in the current study comprised students, lecturers, and e-tutors based at one ODL university. In order to engender best practices of effective teaching in an ODL environment, the Community of Inquiry (Col) framework and Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) theory were applied to the research findings of the current study. The findings indicate that effective teaching of an online English module in an ODL context could take place when content is effectively structured; assessment reflects course content; there is teamwork and collaboration amongst lecturers; students effectively interact with the material, lecturers/e-tutors, and with each other. The findings of this study add to the volume of research on best practices for effective online ESP teaching in ODL higher learning institutions. / English Studies / D. Litt. et Phil. (English)

Upon IRB approval, a corpus of 1,192 texts consisting of three assignments written by a total of 1,736 first year engineering students was compiled, and 117 pedagogical materials were collected. Using an iterative quantitative-qualitative approach to written discourse analysis, instances of formulaic language (4- and 6-word sequences) were identified in the corpus; formulaic language was then coded for the rhetorical functions expected in problem statements as qualitatively identified in the pedagogical materials. Additionally, three discourse-based interviews were conducted with First-year Engineering Faculty. Interview data was coded for themes of effective communication and used to triangulate the findings from the corpus analysis.

This report surveys existing literature in order to determine how best to implement target language captioned video in a classroom of a particular context: a Korean church in the U.S. whose members desire to improve their English language ability for the purpose of sharing the gospel of resurrection in English. In order to gain insight into the benefits and limitations of target language captioned video on second language listening comprehension and vocabulary acquisition and thus how to use the learning tool optimally, literature is reviewed regarding word knowledge, processing strategies, and reported gains or effects of the use of captioned video. Then, incorporating the information gleaned from the literature, two sample lesson plans are presented utilizing the C-Channel English testimony videos as the primary tool for instruction. / text