Modality in students’ expository essays : a study of the effect of socio-cognitive instruction

Abstract

This thesis presents the results of an analysis of changes in the use of modality in the expository essays of a group of Singapore Secondary Three students after receiving socio-cognitive instruction in expository writing. Instruction was aimed at raising student awareness of the socio-cultural context of a writing task, and explicit teaching of the genre practices and socio-rhetorical thinking processes associated with expository genres. Pre- and post-instruction essays were analysed using Halliday’s (2004) Systemic Functional Grammar. Comparison of modality expressions in pre- and post- instruction essays shows positive changes in the latter in frequency of modality expressions, range of lexico-grammatical forms for expressing modality and deployment of modality in relation to the discourse moves of stance assertion and stance support. Results in the further comparison of 5 single cases supported the collaborative findings.