Cecile Badenhorst

Literature reviews, citations and intertextuality in graduate student writing

Abstract Literature reviews are a genre that many graduate students do not fully understand and find difficult to write. While the genre, language and rhetorical moves of literature reviews are widely researched, less research focuses on citation use in literature reviews. Teaching students ‘how-to’ write the literature review through explicit genre awareness is not enough. What is needed, is a focus on the discursive nature of citations since citations are a core ingredient in literature reviews. The complexity of citing, referencing and using sources is difficult to teach in university classrooms, especially in courses that focus on content knowledge. When it is taught, it is often imparted to students as conventions with particular organisational features around citation styles. Or it is taught within the discourse of morality and academic dishonesty that surrounds plagiarism. What is lacking is a pedagogy that relates citing to the more complex discursive practices that are implicit and deeply embedded in particular time-bound contexts. The purpose of this research was to explore citation patterns in 23 draft and final masters’ student literature review papers to better understand the ways in which students use sources in literature reviews with the aim of informing pedagogy. Findings indicate that the concept of intertextuality, specifically, transgressive intertextuality, intertextual engagement and discursive intertextuality can help with the teaching and learning of literature reviews and citation use.

A methodological evaluation of an integrative pedagogy for engineering education

This paper is an evaluation of the pedagogy of a five-day co-curricular course, called the “Lead by Design Institute on Leadership, Diversity and Dialogue For Graduate Students in Engineering.” The intentions in the design of the pedagogy were: to include elements that align with the motivations and values that engineering students bring to their work and study; and to enhance the retention of women and other diversities in engineering, and their long-term sustainability in the practice of engineering. The Lead by Design Institute was offered to an initial group of engineering graduate students within a qualitative research project on diversity-attracting integrative pedagogies for engineering education. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the design and implementation of the pedagogy of the Lead by Design Institute so that we can understand how to improve or alter the pedagogy for future offerings and to more effectively meet the goal of integrative engineering education. To perform the evaluation, a process of key questions based on Lonergans basic definition of method is used, with the answers to the questions grounded in the qualitative research data collected during the Institute.

Fostering Reflective Practice for Sustainable Professional Development: Lead by Design, a Pedagogical Initiative

In the 21st century, practicing engineers are working under conditions of rapid change, both in the technologies of engineering as well as in the contexts in which engineering is practiced. The “grand challenges” of today and of the future require a broad range of knowledge and skills, and the capacity to connect engineering with other sectors. To respond, universities must educate engineers who understand engineering principles at fundamental levels, but who also have nimble design and process skills. This paper presents findings from a research project that developed, implemented and evaluated new diversity-attracting integrative pedagogies intended to tap into the motivations and values that engineering students bring to their work and study. Our initiative, named Lead by Design, responds both to the changing demands on engineers and to ongoing efforts to increase the retention of women in the profession. In this paper, research findings are presented from the Lead by Design project that show the importance of narratives in fostering the reflective practice that can underpin both a sense of identity as an engineer and professional sustainability.

Becoming an Academic: Reflective Writing and Professional Development

For many academics, the challenge of traversing the competitive discourse demands of conducting research and publishing journal articles while navigating teaching and administrative loads often leads to anxiety and stress. Becoming an academic is often an implicit process where one is left alone to find one’s way. Located in Canada, the Faculty of Education, Memorial University, Newfoundland, has over the past six years, hired a number of professionals: educators and counsellors. Many of these new faculty have less experience in conducting research than new faculty in non-professional disciplines. To counter these difficulties, some new academics decided to form a faculty writing group. The writing group had limited success until members set aside a period of five months to devote to reflective practice. Our qualitative analysis of the data shows that the written reflections were crucial for learning the professional practices of becoming an academic. The data indicated that group members found this method enabled them to reflect on the shifting boundaries between personal/professional, work/home, and novice/expert. The weekly writing also allowed members to explore emotions not often voiced in academic spaces. The purpose of this chapter is to show how reflective writing supported the professional development of group members.

Graduate student writing: Complexity in literature reviews

Purpose The purpose of this study is to explore Master’s students’ literature reviews to better understand the literacies required for engaging in complexity in this genre and to inform graduate student pedagogy. Design/methodology/approach In this qualitative study, data were collected in the form of student literature review papers (23 drafts and 23 final versions) from students attending a research seminar course in an all-course Master’s program. All papers were analyzed for citations patterns, genre awareness and levels of complexity. Findings Results highlight the nature of complexity in this genre – that this complexity is underpinned by discursive issues such as “truth”, “claims” or “facts” that often mislead novice academic writers, and recognizing that knowledge contested in academic contexts is important to understanding and teaching students about complexity in writing. Originality/value One of the most challenging writing tasks graduate students face, is the literature review. Literature reviews require sophisticated conceptual maneuverings. Despite being analytical in nature, many students find it difficult to engage with the layers of complexity required in this genre. How do we make the complexity in literature reviews more visible and accessible? The argument in this paper is that understanding the nature of complexity in literature reviews can enhance writing processes and intentional explicit pedagogy.

Fostering Subjectivity in Engineering Education: Philosophical Framework and Pedagogical Strategies

This paper argues that fostering subjectivity in engineering education will aid engineers in understanding the connections between their own life values and motivations and their career choice and development. By fostering subjectivity in engineering education, we mean linking the person who studies with what they are studying, a definition that can be situated within the philosophy and methodology of Bernard Lonergan. This paper also presents evidence for pedagogical strategies to foster subjectivity based on our definition of subjectivity in engineering education. We analyze data collected during a pilot offering of a co-curricular course for engineering graduate students (the Lead by Design Institute) to determine to what extent the Lead by Design pedagogy fostered subjectivity. The paper concludes with reflections on implications for future engineering education, from the philosophical framework of Lonergan’s model of the human subject, and from our analysis of the Lead by Design pedagogy.

Materiality and Subjectivity

School children and their desks enter into sustained relationships from the moment they connect. No longer restricted only to the teacher or the learner, pedagogical interest has been increasingly turning to the materiality of schooling (Fenwick & Landri, 2012; O’Donoghue, 2010; Rasmussen, 2012; Roehl, 2012; Taylor, 2013). The situatedness of material objects is a dialectic of performative agency. As such, the school desk stands as an innocuous and often taken-for-granted familiarity.

Lead by design : pedagogical approaches to foster reflective practice and career-long sustainable professional development

In the 21 century, practicing engineers are working under conditions of rapid change, both in the technologies of engineering as well as in the contexts in which engineering is practiced. The “grand challenges” of today and of the future require a broad range of knowledge and skills, and the capacity to connect engineering with other sectors. To respond, universities must educate engineers who understand engineering principles at fundamental levels, but who also have nimble design and process skills. This paper presents findings from a research project that developed, implemented and evaluated new diversity-attracting integrative pedagogies intended to tap into the motivations and values that engineering students bring to their work and study. Our initiative responds both to the changing demands on engineers and to ongoing efforts to increase the retention of women in the profession. Our research findings show the importance of narratives in fostering the reflective practice that can underpin both a sense of identity as an engineer and professional sustainability.