Elsevier

Journal of Second Language Writing

Volume 25, September 2014, Pages 23-39
Journal of Second Language Writing

Writing science in an upper elementary classroom: A genre-based approach to teaching English language learners

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jslw.2014.05.001Get rights and content

Highlights

  • Case study presents implementation of a genre-based pedagogy.

  • Procedural recounts taught in a 4th grade classroom with L2 writers.

  • A representative L2 writer demonstrates writing development.

  • Instructional practices for writing school-based genres are identified.

Abstract

This case study presents the implementation of a genre-based pedagogy informed by systemic-functional linguistics (SFL) with the goal of scaffolding the teaching of procedural recounts in the content area of science in a 4th grade classroom with several English language learners (ELLs). We use one L2 writer representative of the mainstreamed ELLs to demonstrate how the genre work impacted the focal student's writing development. This article addresses a major need in the field of second language writing: identifying instructional practices for teaching upper elementary ELLs to write school-based genres.

Introduction

Ji Soo,1 an English language learner (ELL) originally from Korea in Mrs. Darcy's fourth grade classroom, is able to speak with his classroom colleagues well and write personal stories and narratives in English language arts, but he is having difficulties in the content area of science. Specifically, he struggles to write about science experiments. The focal teacher participating in this study, Mrs. Darcy, noted Ji Soo is a “typical” L2 writer in her classroom: He is very focused during science instruction, is able to read the textbook with guidance from the teacher, but when it comes to science writing, he struggles. Concerned about L2 writers’ struggles in science writing, the teacher asked us to pay particular attention to Ji Soo as she was interested in helping her diverse students write about science experiments.

During the upper elementary grades (Grades 4–5, ages 9–11), the content areas become more specialized. There is an increasing focus on more linguistically complex and cognitively demanding disciplinary-based written tasks and genres beyond students’ familiar text types such as stories or personal narratives (Christie & Derewianka, 2008). These tasks and genres, placing new linguistic and cognitive demands on all upper elementary students, can be even more challenging for ELLs, especially in the content area of science (Carrasquillo et al., 2004, Fang et al., 2010, Schleppegrell, 2010). In addition, little is known about best practices for writing instruction for upper elementary ELLs, and even less for science writing, the focus of this article.

Science writing has distinctive linguistic features, and knowledge of these features is important in order to understand how language constructs disciplinary knowledge in science (Fang, 2006, Halliday and Martin, 1993). Halliday and Martin (1993) discussed how science organizes and condenses knowledge and information through complex clause structures, very different from the ways meanings are constructed in students’ everyday language. In order to meet the needs of scientific methods, arguments, and theories, the language of science has evolved from the language of everyday communication to contain unique scientific lexicon and grammar (Halliday & Martin, 1993). School science, as a recontextualized version of science for school purposes, still possesses characteristics of professional science discourse, such as informational density, technicality, abstraction, and authoritativeness (Fang & Schleppegrell, 2008).

In her study of science discourse and language demands for ELLs, de Oliveira (2010) has established that science uses language in unique ways, following the work by Fang (2006), Fang et al. (2010), and Fang and Schleppegrell (2008). Through an analysis of a corpus of school science texts, de Oliveira (2010) identified language demands that occur in the reading students do and the writing they are expected to produce in science: (1) Technical terms and their definitions: Technical terms occur throughout science writing and some are in bold and defined, but some technical terms may appear without a definition or definitions may be difficult to find while the definition itself may contain complex language; (2) Connectors with specific roles: Connectors (e.g., or) may have specific roles in science and all roles may occur within a few paragraphs; (3) Everyday questions and words with specialized meanings: Everyday questions may occur at the beginning of paragraphs with highly technical language following. Words with specialized meanings in science can occur throughout and be confusing as their everyday meaning is different from their specialized meaning in science; (4) Noun groups and their zigzag structuring: Several noun group structures appear in science—head only, pronouns, noun with pre-modifiers, noun with post-modifiers, and noun with pre- and post-modifiers. Nouns are introduced and referenced throughout a passage and their zigzag structuring may be complex to follow. Zigzag structuring involves the introduction of a nominal group in one sentence and then the tracking of these nominal groups in other sentences, creating a zigzag movement. Lexical content is accumulated in complex and expanded noun groups, creating high lexical density. These language demands in science were the main patterns found in the corpus.

These discipline-specific ways of presenting and organizing information in science construct scientific disciplinary knowledge. Students need experience with the authentic language of science so they can learn to communicate their knowledge and understanding of the natural and social worlds. Writing school-based genres in science with a focus on the language of school science constitutes an essential part of such an experience. In a study of the current practices of teaching science writing to 3rd-grade students, Lee, Maerten-Rivera, Penfield, LeRoy, and Secada (2008) highlight the need for teacher education programs to better prepare teachers to teach writing to elementary students, including ELLs. To learn to produce effective written science texts expected at school, students need to become familiar with school science genres (Schulze and Ramirez, 2007, Tower, 2005).

Enabling upper elementary students to become successful writers in science is complex and places new demands on teachers who are called to provide specific kinds of instructional support (Fang & Schleppegrell, 2008). Recognizing the particular challenges upper elementary students and their teachers might encounter in learning and teaching writing, recent work has called for educators to apply the concept of genre to writing instruction (e.g., Gebhard and Harman, 2011, Hyland, 2003, Hyland, 2007, Reppen, 1994, Tardy, 2006) to support L2 writers in mainstream content area classrooms. Among the various approaches to teaching genres, genre-based pedagogy informed by systemic-functional linguistics (SFL), known as the “Sydney School,” has been used in elementary and secondary schools and in immigration education programs in Australia to support ELLs in writing the types of texts they will encounter within various disciplines in schools (Christie and Derewianka, 2008, Martin and Rose, 2005). Such genre-based pedagogy has also been implemented in U.S. K-12 schools in content area writing (e.g., de Oliveira and Iddings, 2014, Harman, 2013, Schleppegrell, 1998, Schleppegrell and de Oliveira, 2006). An increasing number of studies draw on SFL and combine an analysis of students’ written texts with teacher interview and classroom observation data (e.g., Brisk et al., 2011, Brisk and Zisselsberger, 2010, Gebhard et al., 2010, Schleppegrell, 2010, Schulze, 2011).

Among the various genres in science, procedures, procedural recounts, explanations, reports, and expositions are the most recognizable school science genres (Veel, 1997). Of these five school science genres, procedural recount has been specified as “the prototypical experimental genre, learned in childhood and early adolescence, and remaining important throughout adolescence” (Christie & Derewianka, 2008, p. 181). Nevertheless, many teachers lack an explicit awareness of how the organizational, grammatical, and lexical features work, or how to familiarize students with the specific genre and language features to construct their procedural recounts (Christie and Derewianka, 2008, Fang et al., 2010). Most students, including L2 writers, do not just pick up the specific genre and the language features of school science genres (Martin & Rose, 2005). Thus, to develop students’ familiarity with school science genres, a genre-based pedagogy has been proposed to assist teachers in supporting their students (Fang et al., 2010, Martin and Rose, 2005).

Despite the increasing attention to teaching genres to elementary ELLs, more work is needed on instructional practices for teaching upper elementary students to write school-based genres in science. With insufficient or uninformed instructional practices, many upper elementary students may continue to experience difficulty with writing. They might have little experience with the type of writing they will encounter in science textbooks, writing assignments, and assessments. These students might face challenges in producing school-based genres unless they are supported by teachers with knowledge about genre features, school-based language, and the developmental nature of students’ science writing (Carrasquillo et al., 2004, Fang et al., 2010). These issues help frame our research questions for this study.

During the spring of 2011, we worked with a fourth grade mainstream teacher, Mrs. Darcy, to develop support for her diverse students learning to write about experiments focused on the science topic “density.” The teacher was particularly interested in helping her diverse students write about science experiments using procedural recount—one genre of writing that may take place in classrooms related to science experiments. Through meetings with the teacher and in observations of her science classroom activities, we identified ways that the genre-based pedagogy informed by SFL could enhance Mrs. Darcy's teaching of writing procedural recounts. This case study involved our collaboration with Mrs. Darcy to implement a genre-based pedagogy informed by SFL with the goal of scaffolding her teaching of procedural recounts and the writing tasks she assigned as part of doing and learning science. We use the case of Ji Soo, the ELL in Mrs. Darcy's classroom introduced at the beginning of this article, to show changes in his writing after the genre work. First, we contextualize the study within the research literature. Next, we provide the methods for the study, including the participants and setting, research questions, and data analysis and collection. Finally, we present the results and discussion followed by a conclusion. The next sections show how Mrs. Darcy developed support for her diverse students writing procedural recounts about hands-on experiments in science. We identify ways that the genre-based pedagogy informed by SFL could enhance Mrs. Darcy's teaching of writing procedural recounts.

Section snippets

Writing to learn science for upper elementary L2 writers

Research suggests that U.S. elementary school education is almost entirely a matter of literacy—of learning to read and write (i.e., early literacy instruction) and reading and writing to learn academic content (i.e., content area literacy instruction). In their study of six upper elementary classrooms in the U.S., Allington and Johnston (2002) pointed out that students learn and practice beginning reading and writing skills through primary grades (grades K-3). Starting from Grade 4, students

Systemic-functional linguistics as a discourse analytic and pedagogical tool

The use of technical language and genres characteristic of school science have been investigated in the area of writing by scholars who use a meaning-based theory of learning and discourse analytic tool, systemic-functional linguistics (SFL). SFL offers a framework for analyzing how particular language choices of writers construct the meanings within a text and highlights how social contexts influence textual realizations. In any context, language realizes three kinds of meaning, or

Genre-based pedagogy: teaching–learning cycle

Based on SFL as a pedagogical tool to help teachers support students in learning to write effective school texts, Martin and Rose (2005) extend the teaching–learning cycle developed by Rothery (1994) and emphasize the role of interaction and guidance in learning to read and write academic texts. This teaching–learning cycle is made up of three phases of activity: Deconstruction, Joint Construction, and Independent Construction. One representation of the teaching–learning cycle is depicted in

Participants and setting

This study was conducted in a fourth-grade classroom in an elementary school in Indiana. At the time of the study, Mrs. Darcy had been teaching fourth grade for eight years. Mrs. Darcy teaches in a school district with 30% culturally and linguistically diverse students and 70% White students. Many of the ELLs come from families whose parents are associated with “Midwestern” University, including children of international students and immigrants. Mrs. Darcy grew up among educators. Her mother is

Results and discussion

In order to foster the incorporation of genre-based pedagogy in Mrs. Darcy's classroom, we supported the teacher in understanding the purpose and language features typical of the procedural recount genre, which guided her interaction with students to explicitly talk about this genre. Thus, at our first meeting, we provided the following table accompanied by a sample text and highlighted some typical features of the genre. Table 1 displays the purpose, text structure, and grammatical features of

Conclusion

This article addresses a major need in the field of second language writing: identifying instructional practices for teaching upper elementary ELLs to write school-based genres. At the upper elementary grades, the content areas become more specialized and discipline-specific. This article responds and contributes to recent calls for educators to apply the concept of genre to writing instruction to support L2 writers in mainstream content area classrooms, and in particular genre-based approaches

Luciana C. de Oliveira is Associate Professor of TESOL and Applied Linguistics in the Department of Arts and Humanities at Teachers College, Columbia University. Dr. de Oliveira's research focuses on issues related to teaching English language learners (ELLs) at the K-12 level, including the role of language in learning the content areas and teacher preparation for ELLs.

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  • Cited by (0)

    Luciana C. de Oliveira is Associate Professor of TESOL and Applied Linguistics in the Department of Arts and Humanities at Teachers College, Columbia University. Dr. de Oliveira's research focuses on issues related to teaching English language learners (ELLs) at the K-12 level, including the role of language in learning the content areas and teacher preparation for ELLs.

    Shu-Wen Lan is an assistant professor in the Department of Modern Languages at National Pingtung University of Science and Technology in Taiwan. She recently completed her Ph.D. in Curriculum & Instruction with a focus on language and literacy education at Purdue University. Her research focuses on the teaching of English language learners (ELLs) in elementary science classrooms, classroom discourse analysis, and qualitative research. She can be reached at [email protected].

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