Author: vitor

I have two considerations about Chapter eight, both of which based on the many valuable observations and reflections derived from our recent practicum experience. The first point is that, amongst all the activities proposed to build vocabulary and grammar patterns for academic writing in the Chapter, the “Written Recap” activity (p. 215) is definitely the one that I most identify with. This is because, during the practicum, I did notice that the last minutes of class are usually not productive, often turning out to be wasted on the await for the bell to ring. Hence, the “Written Recap” is a flexible activity that can lead students to reflect upon the lesson informally, thereby synthesizing and wrapping up the content. In parallel, it is also a low-risk situation in which they can use newly-acquired mortar and brick expressions. Finally, the notes yielded can be used as an excellent hook for the next class.

My second consideration is, however, a caveat about the “Written Dialogue” activity which Zwiers presents (p. 216). One of the lessons I taught in my practicum coincided with the example given by the author for this activity. In the occasion, I proposed a debate about the second amendment of the American Bill of Rights, which regards the individual right to bear arms. Although the debate was not exactly a written dialogue, I found that students’ opinions were shallow and based on common sense, after all they had not previously researched about the matter (the implications of non-restricted right to bear arms), and therefore did not have elements to build their opinion on. Thus, it is important to emphasize that any debate or perspective-taking activity must regard content which has already been worked in class, so that students have enough grounds to build solid arguments.

When reading chapter 7, in several moments I thought to myself that Zwiers was getting repetitive, since I felt I had already seen many of the claims the author makes. Nonetheless, as I looked more attentively to these claims, I realized that, in fact, they are also pointed out in the two articles we had previously read in this course: “Disciplinary Literacies Across Content Areas: Supporting Secondary Reading Through Functional Language Analysis” and “A Focus on Vocabulary”. While the first work regards the need for teachers to scaffold students into reading academic language (which is qualitatively distinct from their previous language foundations and therefore requires new skills), the second work conveys the positive or negative cycles that students may enter depending on their language abilities–and even suggests the same “analyzing words” and “looking at the context” techniques to expand vocabulary that Zwiers proposes (190). By looking at the two paragraphs of Zwiers conclusion (192), it is possible to identify the strong bridges between the first paragraph and the former article, as well as between the second paragraph and the latter article, which confirm the extent to which Chapter 7 greatly overlaps with these two works. This, however, certainly does not make this Chapter less important, since these are issues that ought to be constantly reflected upon by educators, and since the Chapter also contains new, and rather important, considerations, such as the oral scaffolds for academic reading (167). 

Before reading Chapter 5, I already had some grounds on the potential that rich classroom talk has to engage students into critical thinking. Nonetheless, I had never thought about how crucial asking the proper questions is in order to truly make students reflect upon the matters at stake. To that extent, I also realized that there is a rather fine line between making the right question and making a question that only requests superficial answers which are mostly elaborated to get the teacher’s approval. In light of this, on the one hand, it makes me a bit apprehensive to know that this line can be crossed over if a single word is misplaced in our interrogative sentence. On the other hand, it is very motivating to understand the power that questions may have, if correctly used. The suggestions that the author gives us, such as avoiding IRFs, asking fewer questions, and planning the questions in advance are useful strategies which set a good starting point. Yet they certainly do not guarantee that we always stay on the right path, as situations in the classroom often unfold in unexpected directions. Hence, asking the right questions is actually an art, which requires improvising, planning, practicing, background knowledge, and so forth; it is something to be developed, but never achieved, through failure and success along an entire teaching career.

The article “A Focus on Vocabulary” offers valuable content for educators about the importance of vocabulary, vocabulary learning processes of children and youth, and techniques to promote the expansion of students’ vocabulary. I personally highly appreciate works such as this which provide pragmatical and objective information on teaching strategies that may be helpful guidance in our future professional practice. To that extent, the article is rather enlightening, especially as it suggests interesting methods to teach different kinds of words in different contexts.

Nonetheless, such strategies will be meaningless if the importance of vocabulary is not assimilated. Therefore, by showing the implications of having or not having a wide vocabulary, the section “The Importance of Vocabulary to Reading Comprehension” (2) is, for me, the crux of the text. More specifically the “Matthew Effect” unravels the need for enriching students’ vocabulary by showing that those who have a good vocabulary read more and thus increasingly expand their vocabulary, whilst those who have a poor vocabulary read less, do not sufficiently expand their vocabulary, and thus get ever poorer when compared with the first ones. In light of this, teachers must commit to breaks the latter cycle as early as possible in order to avoid large gaps between their students. Vocabulary is a key factor that can lead to either equality or inequality among students; it is up to teachers fight to make sure that all students are equally empowered by a wide vocabulary.

The perspective of Fang and Schleppegrell (2010), who point out to the changes in literacy demands imposed by secondary schooling, can be directly linked with Chapter 2 of Zwiers’s book. The reason for this connection is that both works view the challenges that secondary students face as a result of their immersion into academic language, which is qualitatively distinct from the previous language foundations they had. This immersion must not be abrupt, because academic language requires the development of new capacities from students in a process that should be stimulated and directed by teachers. In light of this, the Functional Language Analysis can be a valuable approach to help teachers outline their methodology to guide students in becoming literate in this level of language. Nonetheless, I personally found such a strategy rather intricate and challenging to be fully comprehended in a few pages. Even though the article is very well-written and presents a compelling introduction to the Functional Language Analysis, it certainly condensates many aspects of the approach, and therefore incites further research on the matter for educators who want to use it.

Vitor Giberti

Going through the three first chapters of Zwiers’s book was an enlightening re-visit to my own educational experiences. Chapter 1 made me realize the contribution of the social context in which I was raised to the development of my academic knowledge. It was certainly revealing to find out that the stage of academic thinking I have reached is only possible because of the social, cultural, knowledge, and linguistic capital that I acquired outside of the school environment. In turn, by precisely defining what academic language is, Chapter 2 allowed me to identify my academic capacity amongst other personal traits, and so recall which were the influences of my schooling in shaping them. Finally, Chapter 3 enabled me to recognize which strategies my educators used to stimulate my development.

The information provided in the chapters empowered me to look back to my past critically and understand the purposes and implications of many situations I have lived. Thus, I was able to attribute meaning to these situations, and hence resuscitate numerous memories that were in the “useless data sector” of my brain, such as some old teacher’s explanation or some family games we used to play. These memories will be important guidance to my professional practice, since they constitute significant references that I can either emulate or avoid throughout my teaching career.

Vitor Giberti