Revisiting joint construction in the tertiary context.
Humphrey, Sally ; Macnaught, Lucy
Introduction
The value of teacher and student collaboration in text production
has long been recognised by literacy educators, particularly those
working with second language learners and learners from low
socio-economic backgrounds (Cazden, 1996). In Australia, educational
linguists and teachers informed by socio-cultural theories of human
development and learning (Vygotsky, 1978), theories of language and
language development (Halliday, 1993; Martin, 1992) and sociological
theories of framing and classification (Bernstein, 1996) have developed
a number of teaching and learning approaches which aim to scaffold
students towards control of texts valued within particular subject
areas. These practices, which have collectively been termed 'Sydney
School' literacy pedagogies, have been effective in making explicit
to students the semiotic features of the texts they need to produce for
successful learning and in increasing their understandings of language
beyond the clause to whole text and discourse levels. Despite this
success, however, there continues to be concern at how students,
particularly in higher education contexts, can be supported to move from
analysing and reproducing successful instances of genre to independently
generating responses to assignments. This paper will review key aspects
of one Sydney School genre pedagogy, the Teaching Learning Cycle (TLC),
which is used widely in tertiary contexts to support students'
writing development. We will argue for the value of maintaining
pedagogic space within this cycle for teacher-led joint construction of
texts in order to effectively support tertiary students towards
independent and creative control of genre.
[FIGURE 1 OMITTED]
The teaching learning cycle
The genre based pedagogy known as the Teaching Learning Cycle was
originally developed by Sydney School genre theorists working with
primary and secondary teachers in the Metropolitan East Region of
Sydney's Disadvantaged Schools Program (DSP) (Callaghan &
Rothery, 1988; Derewianka, 1990) and adapted for adult second language
learners by TESOL teachers in the NSW Adult Migrant Education Program
(AMEP) (Feez, 1998). In these contexts the Teaching Learning Cycle has
proved a powerful resource for scaffolding literacy development, with
numerous published units of work documenting and/or guiding its
implementation (Burns, 1990; Gibbons, 2002; Dare & Polias, 2001;
Hammond & Gibbons, 2001; Humphrey, 1996; Martin, 1999). As is shown
in Figure 1, each cycle of the TLC moves through three main stages:
Deconstruction, Joint Construction and Independent Construction, with
Field Building and Context Setting informing the learning throughout.
Stages of the teaching learning cycle
While each of the three stages, including Field Building and
Context Setting, is essential to achieving control of and critical
orientation to the target text, it is the stages of Deconstruction and
Joint Construction which are central to writing development,
particularly in higher education contexts (1).
The Deconstruction stage involves two key elements: teacher-led
modelling of the targeted text type or genre within the field of study,
and student-led written and spoken activities to develop familiarity
with the genre (Feez, 1998). In order to generalise understandings of
language beyond the instance of the one text, teachers introduce a
metalanguage (i.e. a language for talking about language). This allows
them to make explicit the linguistic patterns which occur across texts
within the genre, and enables students to transfer their knowledge of
those patterns to other situations. While teacher-led demonstration is a
key part of this stage, the term Deconstruction has been adopted to
conceptualise the broader goal of 'pulling apart a text to see how
it works', and, as this activity typically reveals, the role of
language in privileging particular perspectives over others. Ultimately,
such an awareness orients students critically towards text (Rothery,
1996).
Ideally, two examples of the genre are introduced in the
Deconstruction stage. One is used by the teacher to demonstrate
features, while the other is used for student-centred analysis of the
features. For students with little experience writing the genre, it is
important to work initially with examples which are prototypical and
which are produced in a context similar to that within which the
students will be writing. However, it is also important that the models
show the potential for alternative wordings and structures within these
constraints. For more advanced groups, a third example of the genre,
which shows variation in terms of the audience or mode is also very
useful, particularly for developing a critical orientation. Crucially,
students need to be familiar with the field of all model texts before
they are used for modelling and analysis. As Rothery (1996, p. 103)
points out, while students build up a shared knowledge of field, they
are 'learning the language of the field, since the two are
inseparable'. Without shared understanding of field, students will
be focused on comprehension issues rather than analysis of models, and
not be able to generate suggestions during Joint Construction.
Typical Deconstruction activities undertaken by students in the
Deconstruction stage include highlighting examples of the modelled
language features, targeted cloze exercises, reassembling segments of
the text, and discussion of how the linguistic patterns assist in
achieving the social purpose of the text. As far as possible, students
work in pairs and/or small groups to encourage development of their
linguistic awareness and use of associated metalanguage.
The Joint Construction stage involves the teacher and students
working to collaboratively construct a text in the same genre but in a
'shifted' field. It is often difficult for teachers to break
down a unit of work or topic so that sufficient field shifts can occur
within the same cycle, however, for students to have sufficient practice
in both analysing and generating texts within the genre, this is an
important consideration. Throughout this collaborative stage,
contributions from students are carefully mediated and then selectively
scribed on the whiteboard or projected screen by the teacher (Martin,
1999).
The use of the metalanguage introduced in the Deconstruction stage
provides an important resource for scaffolding in the Joint Construction
stage (Rothery, 1996). A metalanguage allows for the development of
generalised understandings of language which can be transferred across
instances of the genre and enables teachers to guide the students
towards reshaping the language to meet the expectations of the
particular context (Unsworth, 2001). This typically involves rewording
and re-organising suggestions from the spoken to written model.
Theoretical foundations of the teaching learning cycle
The development of the Teaching Learning Cycle has been informed
most directly by research on child language development conducted within
systemic functional linguistics (Halliday, 1975; Oldenburg, 1987;
Painter, 1984, 1993). From these researchers has come the understanding
of language as a resource for making rather than just expressing
meaning. In particular, Painter's research makes visible key
aspects of children's apprenticeship into language which has
influenced the development of the Teaching Learning Cycle. These
influences include: the interventionist role of adult care-givers in
building children's meaning-making resources in their early years,
and the way middle class parents prepare their pre-school children for
the specialised language of schooling through interaction in everyday
conversations (Painter, 1993). These findings support the work of
Bernstein and his colleagues (Bernstein, 1996; Hasan & Cloran, 1990;
Williams, 2008) who argue that children from families of higher
socio-economic status are sensitised to educational knowledge through
particular types of guided interactions such as those which occur around
bedtime story reading. Painter (2000, p. 83) argues that the
'fashions of speaking' involved in these interactions, such as
using definitions, generalising and explicit talk about language,
prepare children for making abstract and metaphorical meanings which are
pervasive in written language. Such meanings allow for learning to
progress more efficiently. These understandings are fore-grounded in the
Joint Construction stage of the Teaching Learning Cycle, where the
teacher's role is described as 'guidance through interaction
in the context of shared experience' (Martin, 1999, p. 126).
Further influences on the conception of the cycle, and particularly
on the Joint Construction stage, came through Australian educators
working with Aboriginal learners in remote communities (e.g. Gray,
1988). These educators drew on theories of learning proposed by Lev
Vygotsky (1978) and the concept of scaffolding developed by Bruner and
his colleagues from their research into child/parent interactions around
books (e.g. Wood, Bruner & Ross, 1976). Vygotsky (1978, p. 57)
argued that higher mental functions, mediated through language, develop
first through interaction with others before being internalised. For
effective learning to take place, however, Vygotsky argued that teachers
needed to pitch instruction to the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD),
i.e. the space between what learners could achieve alone and what they
could achieve jointly with an expert partner (p. 86). Working within the
ZPD means that learners need support to successfully achieve the goal of
the activity. Scaffolding refers to the adjustable frameworks which are
temporarily put up as the text is being constructed (Cazden, 1996, p.
168) within the students' ZPD. Importantly, these theorists argue
that the learner is active in the process even when watching a goal
oriented activity carried out by those who are more expert, as long as
they are aware of the goal to be achieved and are themselves task
focused. From a psychological perspective, it is argued that socially
mediated scaffolding promotes a gradual transfer of learning from a
socially mediated process to an internalised or intra-psychological
process (Gray, 2007, p. 36).
More recent interpretations of the work of Vygotsky include
Mariani's (1997 in Hammond & Gibbons, 2001) notion of
'high challenge and high support'. From this perspective, the
metaphor of scaffolding involves providing students with challenging
tasks that are pitched at their potential level rather than their
current level. In terms of writing tasks, this may involve working with
unfamiliar genres in new fields. Crucially, students are provided with
enough support so that, with guidance, the tasks are achievable. The
type of support that enables students to work within their ZPD has been
described by Van Lier (1996) and Wells (1999) as requiring both
'designed' and 'moment by moment' or contingent
elements. Designed scaffolding anticipates the learners' expected
needs. It refers to planned program goals or sequencing of tasks and is
visible in syllabi, lesson plans and in the staging of pedagogical
models such as the TLC. In contrast, contingent scaffolding involves
'specific discourse strategies' (Mercer, 1994, p. 101) that
provide customised support at the time of need. This paper reports on
the planned sequence of support, or what Van Lier (1996) has referred to
as meso level scaffolding, during a Joint Construction lesson.
As yet, few researchers have explored teachers' attempts to
provide a designed sequence of support in the joint construction of
written texts. One significant study conducted by Hunt (1991, 1994)
examined Joint Construction as a curriculum genre. Hunt (1991) found
that the joint writing and accompanying classroom talk could be divided
into 4 stages: Genre Review, Task Orientation, Text Negotiation and
Conclusion. She observed that teachers embed important modelling of the
target genre through instructional elements in different stages of the
joint writing, particularly through the initial Genre Review stage. The
relationship of Hunt's stages to those identified in the tertiary
context will be discussed in section 1.5.
The teaching learning cycle in tertiary contexts
Interest in genre pedagogy in tertiary contexts has largely been in
response to demographic changes in the student body, where local and
international students are challenged to display mastery of unfamiliar
text types--often in a second or foreign language (Hood, 2010).
Documented practices of genre pedagogy in higher education contexts have
focused on the Deconstruction stage of the Teaching Learning Cycle,
describing and making visible the specialised genres and registers of
particular disciplines in face-to-face and electronic modes
(Woodward-Kron & Thomson, 2000; Drury, 2004; Jones, 2004). While
many of the resources developed do encourage interaction in the
Deconstruction of model texts, there has been little attention given to
the Joint Construction stage.
Where Joint Construction has been included in documented practices,
it has been interpreted in terms of peer collaboration in activities
such as brainstorming, planning, drafting and editing of assessment
tasks (Ellis, 2004). In these activities, students are typically
provided with choice in terms of topic selection, pacing, timing and,
importantly, selection of learning partners. However, while these
choices may be justified on the basis of practical grounds and respect
for students as adult learners, there is little control of relationships
that ensure that students are working in the Zone of Proximal
Development. Peer-peer collaboration before teacher-led Joint
Construction can at best be a valuable way for students to consolidate
their current understanding or plan content for their writing. In
contexts such as higher education assignments, where the challenge is
typically high, it can also result in a cycle of problem sharing, and
thus further marginalise students who have found themselves selected in
a group where the necessary expertise is not available.
Teacher-led Joint Construction has not been rationalised in
published practices of Sydney School genre pedagogies at the tertiary
level. There are a number of possible reasons for this omission.
Firstly, as in many secondary school contexts, the constraints of time
in higher education courses cannot be ignored. With courses of thirteen
weeks, typically requiring control of a number of complex genre
configurations to successfully demonstrate understandings of field,
teachers do not have time to go through multiple Joint Construction
cycles where control is gradually diminished. With large and often
heterogeneous groups, lecturers may also feel that Joint Construction is
spoon-feeding and that it may be met with resistance from adult
learners.
While the value of Deconstruction of target genres cannot be
underestimated in supporting students in writing, a number of our
tertiary students continued to experience difficulties producing texts
which met their lecturers' expectations. Lecturers also reported
frustration that student responses reproduced wordings of the model
text. Given our successful practice of Joint Construction in
pre-tertiary contexts with international students, we initiated a
research project which explored the use of both Deconstruction and Joint
Construction in supporting students' writing. In the next section
we report on initial findings from this research project, focusing on
describing the sequence of support provided by the teacher in this
stage.
Analysing joint construction at the tertiary level
The data we drew on to explore Joint Construction at tertiary level
is taken from a pilot study of writing development within a Masters of
Arts (MA) of Applied Linguistics program at the University of Sydney
during 2009. The study focused on students enrolled in the four core
courses of the program. Of the 30 students, approximately 27 were
international students, largely from mainland China. While these
students had experience producing short persuasive genres required for
tertiary entrance examinations such as the International English
Language Test (IELTs), they had little experience producing extended
essays which required them to incorporate evidence synthesised from a
number of authoritative sources or to draw on field specific models to
analyse and interpret data. In particular, these students had never
written the linguistic interpretation genre--a requirement in several of
their core courses. Prior to the Joint Construction lesson, students
completed a guided note-taking activity to extract the key field needed
for writing. They had also completed a lesson in which a model text (see
Appendix 1) was deconstructed. The model of meso level design, described
below, was developed from analysis of three Joint Construction lessons
conducted across a period of six months.
Stages of the joint construction
In contrast to Hunt's four-staged model of Joint Construction
in primary contexts described earlier, our analysis in tertiary contexts
reveals three stages: Bridging, Text Negotiation and Review. Unlike
Hunt, the tertiary model does not distinguish the initial work of the
teacher and students in terms of field and genre but sees both as
integrated within one Bridging stage. This stage prepares students for
writing after they have analysed the model and completed deconstruction
activities. The stage of Text Negotiation, where teachers and students
co-create the text is similar to the collaboration in the primary model.
Hunt's final concluding stage consists of a whole class re-reading
of what has been written. However, the tertiary level Joint Construction
concludes with a more active 'Review' stage which involves the
teacher and students reflecting on and editing their work as it nears
completion. Determining boundaries between stages was motivated
primarily by shifts of field, in particular the activity sequences or
'goings on' of each stage. These shifts will be exemplified in
excerpts from each stage. As shown in Figure 2, our three stages combine
to form an iterative cycle within the larger Teaching Learning Cycle.
[FIGURE 2 OMITTED]
Stage 1. Bridging
The first stage, Bridging, creates a link between analysing the
model and actually constructing a similar text. Essentially, a shift is
made from being a text analyst towards becoming a text creator. In the
sample text, shown in Table 1, the teacher revisits the purpose of the
Orientation stage of the target linguistic interpretation genre. She
begins by drawing on a connection one student has made between an
everyday and technical use of the word 'orientation' (06:30)
and extends this metaphor to include the metaphor of a toolbox which was
introduced in the Deconstruction stage. In doing so, the teacher
explains the metalanguage used to label the stage and reiterates
important understandings of linguistic patterns in preparation for their
next section of writing.
In addition to revisiting shared knowledge of the genre and field,
Bridging may also have a planning function. The teacher and students may
work together through activities such as brainstorming or classifying to
select the content and sequence of the text they will write. This can be
particularly valuable for pre-tertiary and tertiary students who may
need assistance with periodicity, i.e., the flow of information, or
development of themes within and across paragraphs.
Stage 2. Text negotiation
The second stage of Joint Construction, Text Negotiation, involves
teacher-led collaborative writing. In this stage, the teacher invites or
solicits suggestions from the students. These suggestions are
respectfully considered and queried by peers and carefully evaluated by
the teacher. The classroom talk in this stage also occurs in iterative
cycles with text segments incrementally scribed on the whiteboard and
then discussed or edited. Key features of the Text Negotiation stage
include: re-reading the preceding text to orientate students and to
direct their attention to the logogenesis of the text; directing
students to resources to support them in initiating suggestions;
allowing time for thinking; repeating or recasting suggestions;
providing explicit praise or encouragement; and honest evaluation of
preferred language selections. The Text Negotiation stage, preceded by
Bridging, is shown in Table 2.
Stage 3. Review
The final stage, Review, involves an examination of the newly
completed section. Although there may be mini reviewing throughout the
logogenesis of the jointly constructed text, this stage marks the shift
where the teacher and students stand back and assess the text they have
created together. In this stage, the text is jointly edited on the
whiteboard or projected screen. In addition, alternative suggestions are
considered, and both the conventions and the effectiveness of the
linguistic choices are reinforced. This stage provides further
opportunities for students to query why certain language choices have
been selected over others. In the sample Review stage shown in Table 3,
the teacher and students have just completed a paragraph of their
linguistic interpretation. The teacher invites students to edit the
scribed paragraph. She reinforces the importance of using capital
letters for stage names, repeats the connection between an everyday
understanding of the word orientation and its use as a stage name in a
linguistic interpretation, and explores with students alternatives to
the word 'indicates'. Once the Review stage is complete, the
teacher returns to Bridging to prepare students for the next writing
task--in this case a new scaffolding cycle for the next section of the
text (28:53).
Solicitation and mediation strategies
Throughout each of the stages of Joint Construction, we observed a
range of strategies used by the teacher to solicit contributions from
students and to mediate their responses. These strategies give evidence
of the teacher's concern with making moment by moment, micro level
interactions as rich a learning experience as possible. The solicitation
strategies in our data include a range of prompts which can be analysed
along a continuum from more to less explicit. A frequent strategy we
observed is the way teachers begin with an open solicitation and then
provide more support cues as necessary. For example, as shown at the
11.14 minute mark in Table 2, the teacher starts with: 'What can we
say, then, um, about how this purpose is achieved?' As no answer is
forthcoming, she directs students to resources and provides thinking
time. This is followed by a more explicit solicitation: So, um,
it's a directive genre. How does it achieve its directiveness? And
finally the student is able to offer a suggestion.
Mediation provides the opportunity to share not just the
'what' or 'how' of the task, but the
'why'. It also includes evaluation and expansion of
students' suggestions. For example, as shown at the 15 minute mark
in Table 2, the teacher carefully handles a student suggestion, by
replying, 'Yes, I think that's, you know, a very good concept
to be building. But really what we're looking at, as our definition
of genre, is that it is about achieving a goal. So shall we use
goal?' In many cases mediation involves offering students multiple
opportunities to re-word or reform their suggestions as they use
language to think through possible choices. For example, in Table 2, at
the 28:22 minute mark, the teacher mediates the offering of
'indicates' and discusses the subtle differences between the
reporting verbs of 'shows', 'demonstrates',
'indicates' and 'suggests'. Ultimately, if both the
students' and teacher's reasoning are made transparent then
the learning becomes transferrable to other tasks.
Discussion
The investigation of Joint Construction events in the Masters of
Arts of Applied Linguistics program described above has allowed us to
make visible key elements of the support which teachers provide at the
tertiary level and to inform the organisation and planning of successful
joint writing. Following Van Lier's (1996) conceptualisation of
scaffolding in relation to time, our findings suggest that the support
given to students occurs on three levels: at a macro level with the use
of the Teaching Learning Cycle; at a meso level through structured
staged support during the Joint Construction of the target text; and at
a micro level through careful solicitation and mediation of
students' suggestions. The Joint Construction of the target
linguistic interpretation genre, outlined above, produced a Research
Context stage as well as the first phase of the Results and Discussion
stage. Topic sentences of subsequent phases were also jointly
constructed for students to elaborate on in small groups. Following this
small group construction, the teacher also led the construction of the
Conclusion stage. This process took approximately two hours across three
of the seminars of one course. The completed text is shown in Table 4.
While significantly different from the Joint Constructions
described by Hunt and others in school contexts, our initial evaluation
of tertiary level Joint Construction indicates that this stage in the
Teaching Learning Cycle offers considerable support to apprentice
academic writers. One key benefit is the potential exploration of
alternate choices beyond those encountered in the analysis of several
models. Not only does Joint Construction provide opportunities for
students' repertoire of resources to be expanded, but also their
understandings of why certain language choices are more valued than
others. Developing an expanded repertoire of lexico-grammatical
resources is vital for enabling students to paraphrase and summarise
source material without risking a charge of plagiarism.
Another benefit emerging from our analysis concerns the bridge it
provides from Deconstruction to Independent Construction. While
Deconstruction focuses on the analysis of text as a product, Joint
Construction focuses on the dynamic processes involved in creating a
written text. Processes we observed included: frequent editing of
wordings and structures; revisiting previously accepted sections as new
ideas are generated; leaving spaces to fill in later and continual
re-reading of completed sections. These processes are hidden from
learners in the Deconstruction stage which focuses on the final draft of
a successful text rather than the process of its production. Once
students have had the opportunity to participate in a teacher-led Joint
Construction, even if only a small section of text is generated,
peer-peer collaboration of subsequent sections can result in a valuable
sharing of newly gained expertise.
Conclusion
Our analysis of Joint Construction conducted in tertiary classrooms
has provided significant insights into the scaffolding involved but
raises a number of issues to be explored further. Of most interest is
the issue of text ownership in collaborative writing, particularly
consideration of how much control a teacher 'should' have. The
label 'joint' suggests to many that control should be shared
equally between students and the teacher--with the teacher being in the
role of guide rather than leader. Our experience of working with
pre-tertiary, undergraduate and postgraduate level students indicates
that the degree of teacher control varies immensely. In contexts where
students are more comfortable with the field and familiar with the
collaborative process (i.e. they have previous experience of Joint
Construction), the teacher may have more of a facilitating and scribing
role. However, when students are faced with high challenge (bringing
together specialised field knowledge from a number of sources to
construct a new unfamiliar genre, and often in a second language) a much
higher level of support--and thus greater teacher control--is needed.
The issue of teacher control is closely related to the issue of
time. Ideally, such support would include a number of iterations of
Deconstruction and Joint Construction of the target genre in familiar
fields before independent control is expected. Cycles of complementary
reading focused pedagogy, such as Reading to Learn, Learning to Read
(Rose, 2009), would also be used where needed to develop a thorough
understanding of the field before embarking on Joint Construction.
However, in 13 week tertiary courses time constrains the opportunities
for multiple cycles of support. In order to maximise the learning within
tertiary time frames, we maintain that the level of teacher control
needs to be relatively high.
Time pressure is also keenly felt by students as their courses
demand rapid synthesis of new field knowledge. This can mean that
students' confidence when contributing to the collaborative process
will vary. In our experience, careful solicitation and mediation
strategies such as those illustrated in section 1.6, can serve to
increase students' confidence and ensure that they are kept in the
Zone of Proximal Development. As others have argued (e.g. Gray, 2007),
even if students do not have the confidence to contribute to these
collaborative writing processes, the scaffolding provided in Joint
Construction offers them the chance to still be actively engaged and to
learn from more experienced peers.
In order to address the potential tension between control and
creativity, we argue that solicitation strategies within Joint
Construction need to initially open space for creative contributions
from students. This is achieved through starting with open questions and
then gradually committing more meaning to the prompts provided.
Similarly, mediation strategies maintain this creative space while
providing further opportunities for learning. While we acknowledge that
more research is needed for in-depth exploration of the solicitation and
mediation strategies teachers use during collaborative writing in
tertiary contexts, our findings suggest that through the combination of
both designed and contingent scaffolding, Joint Construction retains the
flexibility that is needed to support students towards successful
independent writing.
Appendix
Appendix 1: Model Linguistic Interpretation--
Masters of Applied Linguistics
Stages/ Linguistic
phases Text features
This essay will use Register and Genre Theory
to make visible the meanings of a text taken
from an inner-city council booklet about dog
obedience training. This text provides advice
on how to be an effective dog owner, and can be
characterised as a directive (Iedema, 1997).
This characterisation is supported both by
analysis of the generic structure of the text,
and through the analysis of lexico-grammatical
patterns across stages of the text. This
interpretation will firstly outline the
unfolding stages of the text, and will then
explore the various linguistic patterns which
realise the contextual dimensions of field,
tenor and mode.
The social purpose of the text is to provide
directions on how to be an effective dog owner.
This directive function is achieved through the
obligatory stage of Command (Halliday, 1985b/
1994, pp. 341ff). The other paragraphs in the
text support this obligatory stage in two ways:
with Enablements, which are stages that provide
necessary information or procedures for the
achievement of the command; or with
Legitimisations, which offer incentives and
justifications for complying. The schematic
structure of the text is as follows:
Enablement 1 ^ Command ^ Legitimisation 1 ^
Enablement 2 ^ Legitimisation 2
Analysis of the lexico-grammatical patterns
which realise register can be discussed in
terms of field, tenor and mode. The field of a
text is concerned with meanings about a reality
(ideational meanings) and is realised through
transitivity selections and lexical choices.
Grammatical selections from the transitivity
system reveal that 'dogs' are the most frequent
participants in this directive, and their
natures are described through relational
processes which describe or define them (1a All
dogs are, by instinct, pack animals; 5a Dogs
are like people), or possessive processes which
enumerate their attributes (14a Dogs also have
an excellent memory; 15a Dogs have a limited
understanding of vocabulary). The main semantic
domains developed by the text can be seen in
the following lexical strings: (1) personal
qualities (leadership qualities, consistency,
kindness, patience, confidence, respect); and
(2) control (authority, firm, harsh, training,
method, program, command, permission). These
patterns define and characterise dogs and dog
owners, linking the dependent and loyal nature
of dogs to the leadership qualities needed to
be a successful dog owner.
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Sally Humphrey & Lucy Macnaught
University of Sydney
(1) See www.readingtolearn.com.au) for a description of a
complementary reading oriented teaching and learning cycle, Reading to
Learn, Learning to Read which focuses on Field Building.
Table 1. Stage 1: Bridging
STAGE TIME TEXT FEATURES
Bridging [06:30.25] T: Last week we were Recapping the
pretty happy calling metalanguage of
this an orientation. stage names and
That's nice and connecting everyday
general enough. Who and specialised
did I hear try to terms.
describe what a ...?
What's your name
again?
S: Rebecca.
T: Rebecca, tell us
what an orientation,
how you got the idea
of a functional
stage of an
orientation?
[06:44.01] S: Yeah when I was a ** The sport,
kid we used to do a 'Orienteering'.
thing call
Orientation ** where
you get a compass,
you have to figure
out where you are
and where you are
going, so that's
what an orientation
is in this case as
well.
T: That's fantastic. Revisiting the text
Thank-you very much. that they have
So it's a compass of already created.
where we are, you
know where the
starting point it is
and where we want to
go from there. Um,
we introduced lots
of things. We
introduced the text,
that we're working
with, we introduced
the theoretical
framework ...
[07:43.10] T: So this Recapping the
introduces us purpose of the
straight away to stage.
what the theoretical
tool box is, what
the set of tools
are. Um. And it kind
of tells us where we
are going, what we
are going to do in
the analysis ...
Table 2. Stage 2: Text Negotiation
STAGE TIME TEXT FEATURES
Bridging [10:21.19] T: ... So you see we've Recapping the
done a lot of work previous lesson
already, haven't we? In,
in, ah, beginning this,
this the genre analysis.
If you like. We've,
we've told the reader
what the purpose of the
text is and then we've
made that link between
purpose and genre. We've
been able to name the
genre because of its
purpose. In a general
way. Okay.
Text [11:14.20] T: What can we say, Open solicitation.
Negotiation then, um, about how this
purpose is achieved?
What, what tools have we
got at the level of
genre that enables us to
talk about genre and how
it is achieved?
[11:39.11] T: If you look at your Directing students
notes, and we're looking to use resources
at genre. What we're (notes from last
looking at down this, week.)
under genre you'll see
the tools that we are
going to be using, so
you can refer to your
notes in order to be
able to, um, you know,
move through those and
give me any information,
um, that you can see
that you think might be
useful for us.
[12:01.28] T: So, um, it's a More explicit
directive genre. How solicitation
does it achieve its
directiveness?
[12:09.22] S: Ahh by the means of Student suggestion.
commands. T: By the Acceptance & extend.
means of commands. Ok.
So we've got a, what's a
command, what can we
call a command? The ...
? S: Stage T: Stage.
What kind of stage might
I call that? S: Central
Stage T: Central Stage
So let's work with that
idea of a central stage
first. umm. And we need
to put that into a
sentence that tells us
about the fact that the
text is achieve, that
the genre is achieving
its goal ...
[14:49.20] .... Mediation of the
[15.01.05] T: The text achieves student answer
S: its genre.
T: Ah Ok. I ... I ...
achieves the genre.
T: Yes, I think that's,
you know, a very
good concept to be
building. But really
what we're looking at as
our definition of genre
is that it is about
achieving a goal. We
have this text that's
put through these stages
in order to achieve a
goal.
T: So shall we use goal?
S: Yep. Ok.
T: In that way? The text
achieves its goal
S: through
T: through
S: commands
T: Ah okay good and
what's command?
S: the command stage
T: Ah excellent. Ok.
Through, um, a command
stage. Excellent.
Table 3. Stage 3: Review
STAGE TIME TEXT FEATURES
Review [24:56.14] T: How about that! Do you Solicit editing.
like it? Any changes
you'd like to make or
mistakes I've made?
There could be.
[25:08.05] T: Shall we read it out? Editing on the
S: Did you mean whiteboard.
Legitimisation there? Solicit editing.
T: Oh probably.
Legitimation and
Legitimisation. Thank-you
very much. A good
proofreader is worth
their weight in gold.
Legiti..m..ation. No!
S: Legimisation.
i..zation.
S: i, z. i, z.
T: No no no but we've
got, is it actually
legitimisation?
S: Ah, (sigh)
T: So we've made this
mistake. Not that one.
See when I was teaching
in Japan, if I made
mistakes like this I
would just say 'it's
British English!'
S: laughter!
T: There we go. Thank-
you. Anyone else
spotted something that
needs changing? ...
[26:09.01] Okay so don't forget Reinforcing the
those stage names, put conventions of
them in capital letters, punctuation.
it really does make a
difference. But the genre
name doesn't need capital
letters. Okay so we've
got 'directive' as a
small letter there. And
we've got our stage
names as capitals.
It's a convention....
[00:27:10.25] ... Okay. So here's our Re-reading
findings, 'followed by the text and
supporting stages' and reinforcing
then 'this indicates the linguistic
that'. (under-lining choices.
text).
[28:22.09] T: Can anybody think of Exploring
any other words for alternative
'indicates'? choices.
S: Shows
T: Yep, that's a very
straight. And shows if
you like 'demonstrates',
that would be stronger.
But 'indicates' on that
level where we are
keeping our options
open a little bit.
S: suggests
T: Well done. Yes that's
it. Yes suggests. Ok. So
they are good ones to
come back to all the
time, when you're wanting
to do this work.
Bridging [28:53.13] Okay we've done that, we Outlining
are going to look at new task and
register now. So go to supporting
your notes, turn over resources.
your page, on the second
page of your notes, we've
got here Field, Tenor and
Mode. We've got different
tools in Field, Tenor and
Mode....
Table 4. The text jointly constructed by the teacher and students
A Linguistic Interpretation of 'A message from council'.
The purpose of this essay is to use Register and Genre theory to
analyse and interpret the text, A Message from Council, found in a
Marrickville Council booklet about dog training. First, the stages
the text moves through will be discussed and then the linguistic
features which realise field, tenor and mode. The purpose of the
text is to instruct dog owners on controlling the behaviour of
their dogs. It is therefore a directive genre. The text achieves
its goal through a Command stage (Halliday, 1985; 1994) followed by
supporting stages of Enablement and Legitimisation. The majority of
these supporting stages are legitimisations, which are largely
negative. This indicates that the text is primarily regulative.
The register of the text will be analysed in terms of field, tenor
and mode. Field is understood in terms of ideational meanings, or
meanings of reality, and can be analysed by examining the
participants, processes and circumstances (transitivity patterns).
The major participant in the text is the Council, which is
construed as a conscious entity (e.g. The Council believes) and a
benevolent actor (e.g. The Council assists). This establishes the
Council as an authority.
Tenor relates to ...
Mode is concerned with ...
In conclusion, the analysis of genre and register demonstrates that
the text, A Message from Council, is regulative and constructs an
authoritative relationship with the reader.
