Post on 07-Aug-2015
CROSSING THE BRIDGES:ESL students’ perspectives on academic english learning in the pre- and post-undergraduate context
Eric Cheung (eric.cheung@polyu.edu.hk), Research Associate
Department of English, Hong Kong Polytechnic University
ISFC40 Sun Yat-sen University: Colloquium
Outline
Brief overview of Hong Kong pre-tertiary and postgraduate education
Concerns and expectations on academic literacy from pre-tertiary and postgraduate students
Lexicogrammatical analysis of effective student texts using Appraisal framework
Current support for PolyU students Future research and ambitions
UGC Policy (2007)
Education hub of the region Whole higher education as one force Provision of excellent teaching in all
areas relevant to its role Promotion of “international
competitiveness”
Hong Kong Pre-tertiary Education
More choices for senior secondary school graduates
Annual Policy Address 2000: By 2010, 60% of the senior secondary school
leavers will receive tertiary education Associate Degree
Referring to Community College in the US 2- or 3-year programmes
Higher Diploma Professional Diploma
Hong Kong Pre-tertiary Education
S6 School Leavers
Degree (Year 1)
Em
plo
ym
ent/
Conti
nuous
Educa
tion
Degree programmes (Year 2)
Degree programmes (Year 3)
Yijin Diploma Programmes
HD (3)
HD (2)
HD (1)Pre-Associate Diploma
AD (2)
AD (1)
Degree programmes (Year 4)
Postgraduate Studies in Hong Kong Types of postgraduate studies
Taught Postgraduate Programmes Research Postgraduate Programmes
RGC launched Hong Kong PhD Fellowship Scheme in 2009 to attract students around the world to pursue PhD studies and research in UGC-funded institutions in Hong Kong
210 candidates were offered a fellowship in 2013/14 academic year (28 from PolyU)
Enrolment 2009-13 (UGC, 2013)
2009/10 2010/11 2011/12 2012/13
Sub-degree 7009 6983 6927 7041
Undergraduate 56610 57565 58412 76353
Taught postgraduate 3611 3578 3686 3721
5000
15000
25000
35000
45000
55000
65000
75000
85000
No.
of
Stu
den
ts
Enrolment 2006-2013 (PolyU)
2009/2010 2010/2011 2011/2012 2012/2013
Sub-de-gree
4176 4136 3943 3760
Under-gradu-ate
15265 15611 15605 18571
Taught Post-gradu-ate
8099 8105 8448 3760
100050009000
1300017000
No.
of
Stu
den
ts
Non-local Students Intake, 2010-13
*Data includes Macau SAR and Taiwan.
2010/11 2011/12 2012/13
China 8885 9182 11369
1000
3000
5000
7000
9000
11000
No o
f S
tud
en
ts
Non-local Students Intake (PolyU)
*Data includes Macau SAR and Taiwan.
2010/2011 2011/2012 2012/2013
China 2231 2572 3105
250
750
1250
1750
2250
2750
3250
No.
of
Stu
den
ts
Necessity of EAP
Hyland (1997) conducted a survey of HK undergraduates Students related their academic success to
their English competence and acknowledged EAP classes
They confessed to difficulties in writing, speaking and specialised vocabulary
Struggling between acquiring subject knowledge and mastering English
Thus students would require language support as English is still the principle tertiary instruction language.
Necessity of EAP
Evans and Green (2007) revisited Hyland’s (1997) question Linking sentences, expressing ideas in
correct English and in appropriate academic style are the most difficult in academic writing skills
Lexical and grammatical aspects are seen as difficult
Problems would likely be intensified as more students from the Chinese MOI backgraound enrol on programmes in English-medium universities.
Preliminary Survey
Online questionnaire survey 19 post-secondary students 14 post-graduate students
Focus group interview Semi-formal 30 – 45 minutes; audio recorded 3 post-secondary students 3 post-graduate students
Academic Support Received
Sub-degree Students Postgraduate Students
Types of Academic Support
Sub-degree RespondentsPostgraduate Respondents
Types of Texts Covered
Sub-degree RespondentsPostgraduate Respondents
Content of Support
Sub-degree RespondentsPostgraduate Respondents
Students’ Reflection
Sub-degree Students (2013) Did not see importance of strategies
maintain textual cohesion or coherence such as “topic sentences”
Needed more vocabulary to achieve the “academic style”
Writing support only happened during consultation with supervisors; academic conventions not explicitly taught
Regarded findings as the primary source of evaluation of their own research
(Cont’d)
Postgraduate Students (2009, 2012) Viewed “Critical Thinking” as
Thinking with a “negative” attitude Strong mental disposition to argue Not easily accepting given knowledge
Showed lack of confidence in contesting existing knowledge
Needed academic vocabulary and “style guide”
Reliance on “models” or “templates” of academic writing
Lexicogrammatical analysis of effective student texts using Appraisal framework
26 research papers from MAELT students (local, Mainland Chinese, overseas)
UAM Corpus Tool (O’Donnell, 2008)Annotation of Attitudinal valuesDelicacy of Analysis: AFFECT, JUDGEMENT,
APPRECIATION without sub-types identifiedCorpus analysis
Attitudinal density (per 1,000 words) in each stage
Types of Attitude in each stage
Structural Patterns of Research Articles (Lin & Evans, 2012)
Generic Stages Remarks
Stage 1 – Introduction Value and significance
Stage 2 – Literature Review Related research in the field of study
Stage 3 – MethodologyIncluding Data, Participants
(optional)
Stage 4 – Results and Discussion
Including Analysis of Results
Stage 5 – ConclusionIncluding Implication,
Suggestions, Limitations, Future research, etc.
Selection of effective student texts
Natural, authentic student texts
Assignments vs. Research Articles
Getting A+ in assignments is the priority
Vocabulary for evaluation is essential
Repertoire of interpersonal meanings in student academic discourse
Resources for Evaluation and Critical Stance
MOOD & MODALITY (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2004)
Hedges & Boosters (Hyland, 1998, 2004)
Evaluative language, adjectives as canonical forms (Swales & Feak, 2004)
Evaluative nouns & adjectives (Hunston & Sinclair, 2000)
Appraisal Analysis (Martin & White 2005, Hood 2010)
Discourse Semantics – Interpersonal Meanings
• Appraisal Analysis (e.g. Martin & White 2005, Hood 2010) Engagement
Attitude
Graduation
JUDGEMENT & APPRECIATION as Institutionalised AFFECT
Affect
Appreciation
Judgement
feeling institutionalised as propositionsaesthetics or value (criteria & assessment)
moral or ethics (criteria & assessment)feeling institutionalised as proposals
Martin & White (2005, p. 45)
Evaluation in Academic Writing
Hood (2004a, 2004b, 2005, 2009, 2010) on
Evaluation in the Introduction section
Prosody of interpersonal values in textual periodicity
Recent studies on research genre
Attitudinal values in academic writing (Lee, 2008; Mizusawa, 2010)
Appraisal resources across generic stages of grant proposals (Pascual & Unger, 2010)
Layers of Theme and New in Discourse
(Martin & Rose 2007, p.199)
Method of development
(genre focus)
Point
(field focus)
Predict AccumulateTheme … Rheme
macroTheme
hyperTheme
hyperNew
macroNew
Corpus & Case Study
UAM Corpus Tool (O’Donnell, 2008)Annotation of Attitudinal valuesDelicacy of Analysis: AFFECT,
JUDGEMENT, APPRECIATION without sub-types identified
Corpus analysis Attitudinal density (per 1,000 words) in each
stage Types of Attitude in each stage
Assignment Topic & Requirements A small scale classroom-based research project Relate observations and reflections to
literature read on the topic. Solution-oriented investigation of the approach
to teaching written language (reading and/or writing) with an insider perspective
Test the solution or make recommendations to the solution
Develop concrete solutions which can then be incorporated in the classroom
Effective Research Paper
Attitudinal Density across the Effective Papers
Introduc-tion
Literature Review
Method-ology
& Partici-pants
Findings& Dis-
cussion
Conclusion0
10
20
30
40
50
60
1.59 0.65 0.61 2.24 0.91
8.745.48 7.66 7.32 11.27
43.97
29.6319.61
23.98
36.64
Affect Judgement Appreciation
Att
itu
din
al D
en
sity
(p
er
1,0
00
w
ord
s)
Introduc-tion
Litera-ture Re-
view
Method-ology
Findings & Dis-
cussion
Conclu-sion
Summary of findings
APPRECIATION is the dominant choice to maintain objectivity
Encoding of JUDGEMENT and AFFECT depends on objects of study
Reflecting that effective student writers were able to institutionalise of feelings to establish objective criticality
APPRECIATION
Evaluating teaching approaches, background of study, limitations, etc.
Teachers always find problems [-app] and
difficulties [-app] in teaching students with
low proficiency.
Such approach is effective [+app] to enable
[+app] students to grasp fundamental facts
[+app] and sequences in the context of exam
question.
Firstly, there is a time constraint [-app] in the
lesson.
JUDGEMENT
Evaluating students’/teachers’ involvement, disposition, capabilities, etc.
The teacher in study is an experienced [+jud] female teacher with good pronunciation and excellent class management skills [+jud].
Positive reinforcement can always help students to build up their self-confidence [+jud] and provide them motivation [+jud] to make progress [+jud] and achieve an academic goal [+jud].
Most people ignored [-jud] the teacher and would not listen [-jud] but doze [-jud] or play mobile phone games [-jud].
AFFECT
Evaluating students’/teachers’ emotional responses
it is easy to find that students were well involved [+aff] and interested [+aff]. They laughed [+aff] after the teacher’s joking question in the end.
The writer does not need to worry [+aff] if his writing contains grammatical mistakes or incoherence.
She was young in twenties and interested [+aff] in experimenting innovative approaches in her teaching.
As a result, many teachers were frustrated [-aff] at the gap …, cited by T2 and T3.
Support for PolyU students
Department of English Effective English for Postgraduate Research
Students (EEPRS)
Academic Support Programme (ASP) MA Learning Hub
English Language Centre Credit-bearing academic English courses
Academic Writing Websites
Academic Writing Websites
Future Research
Obtain a larger survey sampling size
Increase corpus size for colligational patterns evoking evaluation
Investigate diachronic change of students' critical voice represented in written discourse
Collect teachers’ and students’ opinions about the academic support website
Ambitions
Develop a dynamic, interactive academic support platform
Human-computation for large-scale research
MOOC
Map the interpersonal values across academic genres
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THANK YOU VERY MUCH!
eric.cheung@polyu.edu.hk