Certaines études, et notamment PISA 2009, soulignent qu’il existe un écart important en France dans les compétences en lecture entre les élèves allophones et les élèves francophones, et que ces derniers réussissent mieux. Cette thèse postule que pour toute réussite éventuelle à l’école, des compétences solides en lecture, et au niveau exigé pour la classe de référence, sont indispensables. Ce postulat est encore plus valable pour les élèves inscrits dans une école secondaire, le public visé par ce travail.Cette étude, basée sur une démarche qualitative, examine six dispositifs d’accueil linguistique pour collégiens allophones nouvellement arrivés en France et aux États-Unis, en vue d’éclairer et de comparer les pratiques de formation à la littéracie scolaire en L2 employées dans les structures éducatives de ces deux états. Bien que la littératie comprenne habituellement des compétences en lecture et à l’écrit, ce travail se concentre sur la première de ces deux compétences (sur la lecture). Cette thèse fournit une lecture à la fois sociolinguistique et didactique des dispositifs étudiés. D’abord, elle examine les textes législatifs, en vigueur en France et aux États-Unis, concernant la prise en charge des élèves allophones nouvellement arrivés dans ces deux pays. Cette analyse a pour but de déterminer si ces textes stipulent des compétences en lecture à développer dans les dispositifs d’accueil linguistique et celles qui devraient être acquises avant que ces élèves ne sortent définitivement des structures éducatives adaptées et intègrent une classe ordinaire. La thèse examine ensuite les notions de littératie et de littératie scolaire, et met en avant des compétences nécessaires en lecture pour une réussite éventuelle à l’école. En dernier lieu, elle souligne des pratiques didactiques, mises en avant par des travaux scientifiques réalisés en contexte nord-américain, pour le développement de la lecture en L2, et vérifie de quelle manière elles sont prises en considération dans les six dispositifs d’accueil linguistique examinés dans cette étude. Au terme de cette thèse, il a été démontré que ces pratiques sont plutôt bien intégrées dans les structures éducatives américaines, et moins bien dans les structures françaises. Cette thèse révèle également que les enseignants principaux, intervenant dans les dispositifs d’accueil américains, disposent de toute une panoplie d’outils pédagogiques pour les aider dans leur travail, matériaux dont ne bénéficient pas les enseignants intervenant dans les dispositifs correspondants en France. / Studies, and notably PISA 2009, have highlighted that foreign students enrolled in French schools significantly lag behind their French counterparts in terms of reading proficiency. This study postulates that grade-level reading proficiency is a pre-requisite to achieving in school and to having fair access to the curriculum. This is even more the case for adolescent second language learners enrolled at the secondary level, the student population on which this study is focused.Based on a qualitative paradigm, this work analyzes six language programs designed for second-language learner newcomers enrolled at the middle school level in France and in the United States. The study reveals and compares the practices used in these six programs for the teaching of academic literacy in L2. Literacy most generally comprises skills in both reading and writing. The focus of this study, however, is on academic reading. The programs have been analyzed from both a sociolinguistic and language-teaching perspective. First, the study examines the legislation in place in France and the United States, regarding the schooling of second language learners in these two countries. This section determines if these texts stipulate the reading skills that need to be developed and achieved by these students during their stay in, and before exiting, the language programs. It then examines the notions of literacy and academic literacy, and endeavors to determine the reading skills necessary for potential success in a mainstream middle school classroom. Lastly, the study examines the best practices, cited in the literature, for the teaching of academic reading to adolescent second language learners. It then investigates if, and how, these practices are incorporated into the six different language programs. Upon conclusion, results of the study revealed that these practices are relatively well incorporated in the American programs but, overall, are not widely used in the programs observed in France. The results also reveal that the teachers of French as a second language working in these programs significantly lack, compared to their American counterparts, research-based teaching materials and models, as well as means of assessment.

Magister Educationis - MEd / Writing is an important skill throughout learners’ schooling trajectory because it is through writing that learners need to situate meaning and sense-making across the curriculum. Writing proficiency becomes even more important when learners access tertiary studies. Yet studies suggest that most students struggle with academic writing. Various authors suggest that writing has not been taught appropriately especially in secondary schooling contexts in South Africa and that writing becomes even more daunting for Second Language speakers of English when they reach tertiary education. There is abundant literature on students’ challenges with academic writing and ways to address academic writing challenges but the use of digital storytelling in relation to academic writing development is recent and distinctively underexplored in the literature.

PhD (English) / Department of English / Language, in general, has always been evolving and dynamic; the same can be said of the English language. Spontaneously, but not unexpected though, since the beginning of this 21st century which saw the introduction of the internet, there have been noteworthy manifestations in the structure and use of varied forms of the English language on social media. This study aimed at exploring, describing and explaining the linguistic features associated with the new communicative order – social media – and their communicative functions, vis-à-vis their impact on Ghanaian university students’ acquisition of academic literacy. To do this, the study adopted a qualitative method and an ethnographic approach in understanding the netnographic realities on social media. In addition, the sociocultural theory and the theory of error analysis served as the philosophical underpinnings which guided the research. Participants of the study (largely undergraduate students) were drawn from two universities in Ghana – the University of Ghana, and Valley View University. The total sample size was one hundred and eighty eight (188). It was found that frequent and prolonged use of social media discourse does impact negatively on the academic literacy of students. The findings also indicate that social media use overtime becomes addictive and this directly results in limited time span and low attention span of students. Again, the study found that over engagement on social media discourse leads to a general breakdown in both sentence and discourse structure of academic writing resulting into uncontrolled deviant spellings, omission and misuse of punctuation marks and capitalisation, as well as a high level of colloquialism. Despite these negative influences, it was found that there are some positive potentials of social media that can be harnessed to support academic literacy. The study, thus, recommends that the affordances of social media communication should be retooled to support the teaching and learning of academic literacy.

Magister Educationis - MEd / Writing is an important skill throughout learners’ schooling trajectory because it is through writing that learners need to situate meaning and sense-making across the curriculum. Writing proficiency becomes even more important when learners access tertiary studies. Yet studies suggest that most students struggle with academic writing. Various authors suggest that writing has not been taught appropriately especially in secondary schooling contexts in South Africa and that writing becomes even more daunting for Second Language speakers of English when they reach tertiary education. There is abundant literature on students’ challenges with academic writing and ways to address academic writing challenges but the use of digital storytelling in relation to academic writing development is recent and distinctively underexplored in the literature. In this study, I seek to explore the potential that digital storytelling has in the teaching of undergraduate academic writing skills. I will focus on first year students' academic writing skills, how they are taught currently and how technology in the form of digital storytelling can help first year students improve their academic writing skills. The theoretical framework for the study is largely based on the New Literacies Studies which is championed by members of the New London Group such as Street and Street (1984) Lea and Street (2006) among others. The theoretical framework will draw on the notion of literacy as social practice rather than a set of reading and writing skills which explains why educators need to find new ways of teaching academic writing skills. I use semiotics and multimodality as a foundational concept for using digital storytelling in academic writing. That is because semiotics and multimodality further support the idea that literacy goes beyond words but that audio and visual elements are also part of learning and can help engage students in their academic work. The main aim of this proposed research is to explore both students and lecturer practices of digital literacies in the teaching and learning of academic writing at The Cape Peninsula University of Technology (CPUT). I propose the following research objectives: (i.) elucidate current academic writing scaffolding in academic modules; (ii.) draw on the use of digital storytelling in a first-year undergraduate course; (iii.) shed light on lecturers and students’ perceptions of the ways digital storytelling impacts on first-year academic writing; (iv.) highlight the implications of infusing multimodality into academic writing in this context; and (v.) explore the ways first-year students’ take on new writing practices and how these new practices are facilitated by the ii lecturer. I plan to use a qualitative research method to achieve my set objectives. I have opted to conduct action research, as both participant and researcher. The qualitative research method allows me to use the following research tools: document analysis; questionnaires and interviews. I analyse 15 student essays in order to elucidate current academic writing scaffolding in academic modules. These essays are divided into three categories: high performance; average performance; and low performance. Then questionnaires are distributed to students through a Google Forms link. Of the 40 student participants; 32 students filled in the questionnaires. The interviews were conducted with three lecturers across two departments at CPUT. These interviews, together with questionnaires that the students filled in served to address the following objectives: draw on the use of digital storytelling in a first-year undergraduate course; shed light on lecturers and students’ perceptions of the ways digital storytelling impacts on first-year academic writing; highlight the implications of infusing multimodality into academic writing in this context; and explore the ways first-year students’ take on new writing practices and how these new practices are facilitated by the lecturer. All the ethical considerations were adhered to for my research. I categorized my findings according to the research questions that I posed in the study. There were three research questions which serve as the three main themes of my data analysis. However, during the process of analyzing the data, a fourth theme emerged. The first finding indicates that academic writing scaffolding in academic writing modules is adequate for students who have essays in the high-performance category. However, it is inadequate especially for students who wrote essays in the low performance categories as they could not meet the demands of academic writing. The second finding indicates that students are able to use digital storytelling to help them with various aspects of academic writing. They are able to improve language and grammar; the structure of their writing, that is, the introduction, body and conclusion. The third finding illustrates that lecturers also feel that there are academic writing benefits to when using digital storytelling. Even though that may be, the use of technology for the medium of digital storytelling proved to be somewhat difficult. That is mostly because students did not have access to various technology such as internet connection or even equipment to complete the digital stories unproblematically. Then the fourth finding emerged during lecturer interviews, that is, fees must fall protests and the impact it had on the traditional university structure across. Fees must fall protests led to disruptions in academia because one key aspect they highlight is the need for decolonisation of the curriculum The use of digital storytelling then not only addressed the student academic writing challenges that are highlighted by this study, but also speak to decolonisation of the curriculum because it is an innovative way for students to engage with the demands of academic writing. The conclusion of my thesis is that as useful as digital storytelling is in academic writing; those who wish to use it as a teaching tool need to be well versed with technology as it can have challenges if not used adequately. The most pertinent of the factors revealed is that there is a need for innovative ways to teach the 21st century student.

Doctor Educationis / Writing is an important skill throughout learners’ schooling trajectory because it is through writing that learners need to situate meaning and sense-making across the curriculum. Writing proficiency becomes even more important when learners access tertiary studies. Yet studies suggest that most students struggle with academic writing. Various authors suggest that writing has not been taught appropriately especially in secondary schooling contexts in South Africa and that writing becomes even more daunting for Second Language speakers of English when they reach tertiary education. There is abundant literature on students’ challenges with academic writing and ways to address academic writing challenges but the use of digital storytelling in relation to academic writing development is recent and distinctively underexplored in the literature.

Each year more international students enroll in American universities, and administrators nationwide must determine how to meet students' unique writing needs. Compared to similar institutions of higher learning, Brigham Young University (BYU) has a large percentage of international students—4.3 percent of the student body, approximately 2,000 students each year from 112 countries. Prior to Fall 2004, international students were placed in courses offered through the English composition program, which focuses on "mainstream" college writers who compose in their first language (L1) and not on second language writers and their unique needs. As a result, many international students did poorly and often failed their general education freshman writing requirement. The Department of Linguistics and English Language at BYU offers some English as a Second Language (ESL) courses in an effort to prepare students for freshman writing, but since these courses are electives and do not count towards the university general education requirement, many students opt not to take them. International students need a viable alternative to the "mainstream" freshman writing course. They need a course in academic literacy, combining the rhetorical and composition elements of a freshman writing course as well as the multicultural and applied linguistic elements of writing. The needs of writers need to be discussed and met through a balanced, interdisciplinary approach. Under the direction of the Department of Linguistics and English Language, I developed a course based upon an interdisciplinary approach to second language writing and academic literacy. I researched the needs of second language writing students, evaluated current ESL programs nationwide, created, implemented, and evaluated a curriculum for an international freshman writing course. It is a course in academic literacy, called Elang 105, which was specifically designed to meet the needs of international students and is now one of the general education (GE) first year writing options at BYU.

No description available.

Text in English / This study examined the vocabulary and academic literacy levels of undergraduate students at the University of Namibia, as well as the effects of an explicit and an implicit vocabulary programme on vocabulary development and academic literacy. The study also sought to determine the effects of the programmes on students’ attitudes about vocabulary and explicit vocabulary strategies. The relationship between students’ vocabulary size, academic literacy levels, and their self-assessment of their vocabulary knowledge was examined. Many students had not reached the desired word mastery and did not have adequate academic literacy skills to cope with the demands of university. Students in the explicit group modestly improved receptive vocabulary knowledge at the end of the intervention but there was no significant improvement in academic literacy skills. Overall, students showed an increase in positive responses regarding their attitudes to vocabulary. / Linguistics and Modern Languages / M.A. (Applied Linguistics)

Thesis (PhD (Curriculum Studies))--Stellenbosch University, 2008. / In this study the experiences of a group of first-year Extended Degree Programme (EDP) students were explored in order to obtain insight into their acquisition of academic literacy. The study was undertaken against the backdrop of a higher education sector that is facing an increasing influx of first-year students on the one hand, and poor retention rates on the other. In South Africa, where the opening up of access to higher education for all citizens has become a political imperative, the need to address the undesirable dropout rate is self-evident. Students’ poor performance at university is often linked to their under-preparedness for higher education studies, and an important aspect of such under-preparedness is their academic literacy. In this context academic literacy is seen as knowing how to speak and act within a particular discourse, and the reading and writing that occur within the discipline as tools through which to facilitate learning. While some students acquire academic literacy by virtue of their participation in the discourse community of the relevant discipline, this is not always so for students who are less prepared for higher education studies. In response to the disconcerting retention rates, higher education institutions have implemented academic support programmes to address the needs of students who enter university with poor school results. One such intervention at Stellenbosch University is the Extended Degree Programme in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, which makes provision for students to extend their first academic year over two years. Since 2006 EDP students have also been required to register for an academic literacy module and it is this group that comprises the focus of this study. Using a case study design, this qualitative, interpretive inquiry was characterized by multiple data collection methods. In this way qualitative data that pointed to the perceptions of the students and some of the lecturers who taught the EDP classes were generated via semi-structured interviews, focus group interviews, observation and content analysis. In addition, descriptive quantitative data was collected and this further contributed to generating the rich, in-depth data that characterize case study research. The analysis of the data was undertaken according to a three-tiered approach, in which the results of the empirical inquiry were first analysed per data source and then themes and trends across all the data sources were identified. Ultimately, these findings were interpreted according to an explanatory framework. The study highlights a number of important issues, key of which is that providing an academic literacy module for under-prepared students can facilitate the acquisition of academic literacy, particularly when such provision seeks to support the different discipline-based mainstream modules. Another important finding of the study emphasizes the extent to which institutional factors, such as increased student numbers, have placed pressure on university infrastructure and human resources. The impact of this situation filters down to the first-year classroom and negatively influences student learning. Finally, the results of the study question prevailing notions about under-prepared students as all of the students in the study, irrespective of their backgrounds and levels of sophistication, attested to the significant challenges that entry into the academic community posed for them. The findings of this study, while specific to the context in which it was undertaken, contribute to the growing body of knowledge in the field of academic development within higher education and the role of academic literacy in student learning.

Submitted by Maicon Juliano Schmidt (maicons) on 2015-07-16T12:54:23Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Vanessa de Oliveira Dagostim Pires.pdf: 3007015 bytes, checksum: 238a817e34cd6d00dbd606cbd3a95a89 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2015-07-16T12:54:23Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Vanessa de Oliveira Dagostim Pires.pdf: 3007015 bytes, checksum: 238a817e34cd6d00dbd606cbd3a95a89 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014-03-14 / CAPES - Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / UNISINOS - Universidade do Vale do Rio dos Sinos / Esta tese de doutorado tem por objetivo traçar o perfil de letramento acadêmico em língua portuguesa desurdos universitários para projetar as possibilidades de desenvolvimento desse letramento de acordo com as necessidades do ambiente universitário. Para isso, a tese analisa as produções de leitura e escrita em Língua Portuguesa de um grupo de universitários surdos brasileiros no curso de extensão a distância “Escrita Acadêmica para Surdos”, a partir de três pilares teóricos: sociointeracionismo (VIGOTSKI, 1925; 2010) educação bilíngue de surdos (LODI, 2004; SACKS, 1990; QUADROS, 2000; NASCIMENTO, 2008; MOURA E HARRISON, 2010) e estudos de letramento como prática social (SOARES, 2002; STREET, 2006; ZAVALA, 2010). Os dados produzidos por meio das atividades do curso foram comparados com produções de universitários surdos portugueses, na busca de legitimação de nossas hipóteses. As perguntas que emergiram a partir do desenvolvimento do curso se referem à construção de letramento acadêmico dos surdos universitários em Língua Portuguesa. A análise das atividades de produção textual se centrou em três propostas de produção do gênero textual resumo. Também foram analisadas algumas atividades de leitura e compreensão textual realizadas pelos universitários surdos. As análises revelaram uma variação em relação ao letramento dos surdos participantes da pesquisa. Acreditamos que grande parte desta variação ocorra devido às diferentes trajetórias de escolarização e experiências de linguagem que os participantes tiveram. Por fim, foram propostas algumas iniciativas com o objetivo de incentivar o letramento acadêmico dos surdos, como maior envolvimento da universidade na tarefa de inclusão linguística desses alunos, promoção de pesquisas e cursos de língua portuguesa para surdos, antes e durante o seu curso superior. / This thesis aims to outline the profile of academic literacy in Portuguese language of deaf students to project development possibilities of the literacy according to the needs of the university environment. For this, the thesis analyzes productions of reading and writing in Portuguese language from a group of Brazilian deaf college students in an online and distance learning course called "Academic Writing for the Deaf" based on three theoretical pillars: social interaction (Vygotsky, 1925, 2010) bilingual deaf education (LODI, 2004; SACKS, 1990, TABLES, 2000; BIRTH, 2008; MOURA E HARRISON, 2010) and studies of literacy as a social practice (SOARES, 2002; STREET, 2006; ZAVALA, 2010). The data generated by the activities of the course were compared with productions of the deaf college students in search of legitimization of our hypotheses. The key questions that have emerged from the development of the course refer to the construction of the academic literacy of deaf students in Portuguese language. The analysis of textual production activities was focused on three proposals of the production genre summary. We also analyzed some activities of reading and text comprehension performed by deaf students. The analysis revealed a variation in relation to the literacy of the deaf participants. We believe that much of this variation occurs due to the different education trajectories and language experiences the participants have had. Finally, we proposed some initiatives with the purpose of encourage the academic literacy of the deaf and also a greater university involvement in the task of linguistic inclusion of these students, promoting research and Portuguese language courses for the deaf, before and during college.