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Synthesis: Identity, knowledge, and practice

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Synthesis: Identity, knowledge, and practice

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The academic role of EAP and the knowledge required of its practitioners feature heavily in Module 1. An important document in helping me to understand these ideas has been the BALEAP (2014) TEAP Accreditation Scheme Handbook.

The broad range of skills and knowledge of EAP practice can make it difficult to understand exactly what is required of EAP practitioners and how to go about acquiring the relevant competencies; having a clear framework makes the task much easier. Regardless of whether one decides to pursue accreditation or fellowship through BALEAP, the handbook provides a structure for professional knowledge and practice that is helpful to all teachers working in (and around) EAP.

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Becoming part of the community: Transition from secondary to tertiary education

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Becoming part of the community: Transition from secondary to tertiary education

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Every year, roughly half-way through the first university semester, I start to receive emails from former students requesting assistance in their university studies. Occasionally students ask for help with specific content in English courses, but the majority are simply struggling to adjust to the new mode of study in university.

There are very few programs or initiatives in our education system (Thai) that help prepare students for tertiary studies. In their study of different schemes to prepare American high school students for university studies, Venezia and Jaeger (2013) note that "the strengths of specific interventions appear to lie in their ability to target subgroups of students ... to offer thorough support in specific areas ... and to provide prolonged support" (p129). My own experience echoes this assessment, however I do believe that there are certain common features, such as class size and independent study, that apply across disciplines. I often show my senior students videos, in which actual students discuss the challenges they face in adapting to their new learning environment.

Video: Ulster University, "Transition from School to University"

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High School Habits to Break Before College

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study.ulster.ac.uk Careers Teacher Resource - A short video of University of Ulster students talking about their experience of the transition from school to university. study.ulster.ac.uk

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Becoming part of the community: Academic integrity

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Becoming part of the community: Academic integrity

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One of the biggest problems I face as a teacher in Thailand is academic dishonesty, primarily in the form of plagiarized writing assignments. This is a widespread problem across the country at both secondary and tertiary levels.

Students plagiarize for many reasons, but the most frequent response I hear is, “but I can copy in my other courses!” Although this seems unlikely, it is true to an extent. Many secondary level courses in Thailand include a large amount of copying text from print or online sources into a student’s notebook, ostensibly as a form of ‘note-taking’. This makes it difficult for students to understand the concept of academic integrity and the severity of academic offenses at university. To help them understand, I use Concordia University's Code of Conduct (2015), which outlines academic offenses and the procedures by which the university investigates them. I also direct them to the Mahidol University International College website for academic regulations, which shows the penalties for plagiarism. I've found that once students begin to understand the role of academic integrity in the academic community, they become interested in it and see it as something helpful rather than something to fear.

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I often tell my students that when they communicate in English, be it in speech or writing, they must create and adopt a new identity. This not so much an exercise in ego-stripping as it is an attempt to help students move away from mental translation; I believe that fluency can only be achieved once the L1 mental middle-man is banished for good.  On the one hand, we are who we are regardless of language; my tastes do not change simply because I’m speaking a different language. On the other, using language means making linguistic choices, and these choices affect how we are perceived by others and how we perceive ourselves.

Hyland (2002) notes that creating an academic identity can be difficult for a variety of reasons (p352). Language teachers thus face a considerable challenge in determining how best to help students achieve their identities. Conversely, L2 learners may have one advantage in the creation of identity: Zerubavel (1995) contends that "multilinguals" have a more flexible approach to cognition than "monolinguals" , and that the development of identity requires such flexibility (pp1099-1100).

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Questions of identity: EAP practitioners

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Questions of identity: EAP practitioners

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Our course has featured some healthy forum banter about the identity of EAP practitioners, and some of our first readings touch on the subject (Martinez 2008, McDonough 2005) . Dr. Alex Ding’s Teaching EAP blog (thanks to Dr. Chris Lima for the link) has some interesting entries in this area, particularly regarding teaching skills vs. academic knowledge.

So who makes the more effective EAP practitioner—the teacher or the academic? Having witnessed the debate on a BALEAP forum, Ding encapsulates the argument neatly:

"At its centre, the debate seems to draw on a basic dichotomy/distinction between skills and knowledge; is it more important to have a firm set of (CELTA/DELTA inspired) teaching skills in one’s repertoire, to be able to go into the classroom and deliver well-staged, neatly executed lessons, or does EAP require MA holders and ‘academics’ (those in possession of ‘paper qualifications’) who, even if lacking in teaching skills and experience, may nonetheless have a much better understanding of academic literacies and the university context, and perhaps also a more questioning, critical disposition, such as we hope to foster in our students?" (2015)

There is a political aspect to this debate. Hyland (2002a) considers changes to language programs based on financial concerns to "weaken our academic role, and threaten our professionalism" (p387). At the same time, concerns over academic roles are not limited to language teachers; Billot (2010) shows that all academic identities change over time, noting that "the role of the academic is both one of change and compromise" (p712). Thus it may be helpful to view the debate on EAP practitioner identity within the larger context of shifting identities across the disciplines.

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This is a potential lesson for lower-level L2 first-year undergraduates. It aspires to the following goals:

-To promote the value of community by having students work together to improve their writing
-To encourage peer collaboration

-To develop basic skills of identifying strengths and weaknesses in writing according to previously-learned criteria

-To reinforce introductory composition skills, primarily paragraph structure

The target group comprises Thai students in their first year of English language undergraduate programs with varying language skills, the mean being roughly equivalent to CEF B2. Additionally, the students come from various disciplines, so the exercises do not require the negotiation or use of disciplinary knowledge or discourse features.

Eventually I want this activity to include a more comprehensive rubric for the writing assignment, so that students can learn to use rubric as a tool in planning and revising their work. The Cavder and Doe critical thinking assignment (2012) will be a strong influence; I also like their inclusion of a postscript element as a way for students to reflect on the writing process. I’d like to develop a similar exercise, albeit at a more appropriate level for my students. Further research into peer collaboration (see Hyland 2007 p158) will also be helpful in refining this assignment and making the collaborative component more meaningful.

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BALEAP (2014) TEAP Accreditation Scheme Handbook. Available at: https://www.baleap.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/TEAP-Scheme-Handbook-2014.pdf (Accessed: 18 December 2016)

Billot, J. (2010) 'The imagined and the real: identifying the tensions for academic identity', Higher Education Research & Development, 29(6), pp. 709-721

Cavder, G. and Doe, S. (2012) ‘Learning through Writing: Teaching Critical Thinking Skills in Writing Assignments’, PS: Political Science & Politics, 45(2), pp. 298-306.

Concordia University (2015) The 2015 Academic Code of Conduct. Available at: http://www.concordia.ca/content/dam/concordia/offices/provost/docs/Academic-Code-Conduct-2015.pdf (Accessed: 02 December 2016)

Ding, A. (2015) What is required to teach EAP?. Available at: https://teachingeap.wordpress.com/2015/05/30/what-is-required-to-teach-eap/ (Accessed: 28 November 2016)

Hyland, K. (2002) ‘Options of identity in academic writing’, ELT Journal, 56(4), pp. 351-358.

Hyland, K. (2002a) 'Specificity revisited: how far should we go now?', English for Specific Purposes, 21(4), pp. 385-395.

Hyland, K. (2007) 'Genre pedagogy: Language, literacy and L2 writing instruction', Journal of Second Language Writing, 16(3), pp. 148-164

McDonough, J. (2005) ‘Perspectives on EAP: An Interview with Ken Hyland’, ELT Journal, 59(1), pp. 57-64.

Mahidol Univeristy International College (no date) Academic Dishonesty. Available at: http://www.muic.mahidol.ac.th/eng/?page_id=15283 (Accessed: 18 December 2016)

Martinez, K. (2008) ‘Academic induction for teacher educators’, Asia-Pacific Journal of Teacher Education, 36(1), pp. 35-51.

Venezia, J. and Jaeger, L. (2013) 'Transitions from High School to College', Future of Childre, 23(1), pp. 117-1365

Zerubavel, E. (1995) 'The Rigid, the Fuzzy, and the Flexible: Notes on Mental Sculpting of Academic Identity', Social Research, 62(4), pp. 1093-1106.