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Framing writing : first year PRC engineering students writing in interdisciplinary modules
Author
Yeo, Bee Gek
Supervisor
Kramer-Dahl, Anneliese
Abstract
This study attempts to investigate issues related to PRC Engineering students writing in interdisciplinary courses at a Singapore tertiary institution, the National University of Singapore. Although research has shown how undergraduates negotiate differences between various disciplinary communities (McCarthy, 1987), and even among modules within a disciplinary community (Herrington, 1985), none of the studies has sought to examine how foreign students understand and handle the demands posed by the academic writing tasks they have to undertake in several interdisciplinary modules in the course of one semester. Thus, this study attempts to fill the gaps in some of these areas by uncovering the perspectives of six first year PRC Engineering students and their tutors on writing in five interdisciplinary modules.
This study has looked at a total of seven writing tasks in the five modules - three from the CTW (Critical Thinking and Writing) module, one each from the two GEM (General Education Module) modules and one each from the two NE (National Education) modules. The data was obtained through a collection of the students' guided writing logs as well as the assignment prompts and documents around them, focus group discussions with the students and individual interviews with five tutors, one from each module.
The findings are presented according to the central research issues which included : examining the types of writing tasks the students in this study have to undertake, the students and their tutors' task perceptions, the resources made available to them by their tutors and the resources they drew on independently as they worked on their tasks, and the kinds of difficulties the students encountered while doing the tasks. These findings were interpreted according to the four categories in MacLachlan and Reid's (1994) interpretive framework in order to provide a better understanding of the framing both the students and their tutors engaged in. It allows for a closer scrutiny of the extent to which the frames aligned or did not align, and to determine the amount and type of framing which would be most helpful to the students as they embarked on the writing tasks. Given the complexity of writing in university-level content courses, especially for students from different linguistic and cultural backgrounds, and the numerous opportunities for gaps in understanding between these students and their tutors, which the findings reveal, the academic literacies approach (Lea and Street, 1998) is deemed to be the most appropriate way for tutors to approach student writing at higher education.
The study concludes by suggesting pedagogical implications for ESL/EAP tutors and content-level tutors so that there may be a better alignment between the students and their tutors' framing of the writing tasks. It also briefly discusses academic implications by suggesting directions for future research.
This study has looked at a total of seven writing tasks in the five modules - three from the CTW (Critical Thinking and Writing) module, one each from the two GEM (General Education Module) modules and one each from the two NE (National Education) modules. The data was obtained through a collection of the students' guided writing logs as well as the assignment prompts and documents around them, focus group discussions with the students and individual interviews with five tutors, one from each module.
The findings are presented according to the central research issues which included : examining the types of writing tasks the students in this study have to undertake, the students and their tutors' task perceptions, the resources made available to them by their tutors and the resources they drew on independently as they worked on their tasks, and the kinds of difficulties the students encountered while doing the tasks. These findings were interpreted according to the four categories in MacLachlan and Reid's (1994) interpretive framework in order to provide a better understanding of the framing both the students and their tutors engaged in. It allows for a closer scrutiny of the extent to which the frames aligned or did not align, and to determine the amount and type of framing which would be most helpful to the students as they embarked on the writing tasks. Given the complexity of writing in university-level content courses, especially for students from different linguistic and cultural backgrounds, and the numerous opportunities for gaps in understanding between these students and their tutors, which the findings reveal, the academic literacies approach (Lea and Street, 1998) is deemed to be the most appropriate way for tutors to approach student writing at higher education.
The study concludes by suggesting pedagogical implications for ESL/EAP tutors and content-level tutors so that there may be a better alignment between the students and their tutors' framing of the writing tasks. It also briefly discusses academic implications by suggesting directions for future research.
Date Issued
2005
Call Number
P301.5.A27 Yeo
Date Submitted
2005