Kok-Sing Tang

Constructing Scientific Explanations through Premise-Reasoning-Outcome (PRO): An Exploratory Study to Scaffold Students in Structuring Written Explanations.

ABSTRACT This paper reports on the design and enactment of an instructional strategy aimed to support students in constructing scientific explanations. Informed by the philosophy of science and linguistic studies of science, a new instructional framework called premise–reasoning–outcome (PRO) was conceptualized, developed, and tested over two years in four upper secondary (9th–10th grade) physics and chemistry classrooms. This strategy was conceptualized based on the understanding of the structure of a scientific explanation, which comprises three primary components: (a) premise – accepted knowledge that provides the basis of the explanation, (b) reasoning – logical sequences that follow from the premise, and (c) outcome – the phenomenon to be explained. A study was carried out to examine how the PRO strategy influenced students’ written explanations using multiple data sources (e.g. students’ writing, lesson observations, focus group discussions). Analysis of students’ writing indicates that explanations with a PRO structure were graded better by the teachers. In addition, students reported that the PRO strategy provided a useful organizational structure for writing scientific explanations, although they had some difficulties in identifying and using the structure. With the PRO as a new instructional tool, comparison with other explanation frameworks as well as implications for educational research and practice are discussed.

Developing multimodal communication competencies: A case of disciplinary literacy focus in Singapore

In science education, there is a growing understanding that learning science involves developing a repertoire of disciplinary-specific literacy skills to engage with the knowledge and practices of the scientific community (Kelly 2008). Such ‘disciplinary literacy’, or the specific ways of talking, reading, writing, doing, and thinking valued and used by the discipline (McConachie et al. 2006; Moje 2007), is central rather than peripheral to the development of scientific understanding (Norris and Phillips 2003). For decades, researchers from multiple disciplines have shed light on the language and discursive features of academic science (Halliday and Martin 1993; Lemke 1990) as well as pioneering various reading and writing strategies to help students master scientific discourse (Hand et al. 1999; Yore and Shymansky 1985). However, in more recent years, there has been increasing attention toward the role of visual, graphical, mathematical, and gestural modes of representation in scientific communication (Kress et al. 2001; Lemke 1998). Research in this area reveals how each mode of representation plays a unique function in representing different aspects of scientific meaning. More studies are also beginning to show how scientific knowledge in specific content consists of a characteristic and recognizable pattern of relationships among multimodal representations (e.g., Hubber et al. 2010; Tang 2011; Tytler et al. 2006).

Infusing Literacy into an Inquiry Instructional Model to Support Students’ Construction of Scientific Explanations

Disciplinary literacy is increasingly emphasised as an important enabler for students to learn science inquiry. However, the nature of literacy instruction and how it supports inquiry-based science in practice still remains unclear. This chapter reports on the design and enactment of an integrated literacy-inquiry instructional model aimed to support students’ development of disciplinary literacy in science. With the goal of understanding how literacy instruction supports inquiry-based science in practice, the study reported in this chapter utilised a design research to develop, enact, and test the literacy-inquiry model in four secondary school science (physics and chemistry) classrooms in Singapore. Analytical cases are shown to illustrate the nature of the literacy activities involved in the classrooms, and how they supported science inquiry in terms of: (a) framing driving question, (b) conducting experiments and collecting evidence, (c) constructing explanations and (d) communicating and evaluating explanations. The cases also illustrate how the participating teachers utilised and integrated literacy activities to support inquiry in their classrooms in order to enable the students to construct and communicate scientific explanations.

The interplay of representations and patterns of classroom discourse in science teaching sequences

ABSTRACT The purpose of this study is to examines the relationship between the communicative approach of classroom talk and the modes of representations used by science teachers. Based on video data from two physics classrooms in Singapore, a recurring pattern in the relationship was observed as the teaching sequence of a lesson unfolded. It was found that as the mode of representation shifted from enactive (action based) to iconic (image based) to symbolic (language based), there was a concurrent and coordinated shift in the classroom communicative approach from interactive–dialogic to interactive–authoritative to non-interactive–authoritative. Specifically, the shift from enactive to iconic to symbolic representations occurred mainly within the interactive–dialogic approach while the shift towards the interactive–authoritative and non-interactive–authoritative approaches occurred when symbolic modes of representation were used. This concurrent and coordinated shift has implications on how we conceive the use of representations in conjunction with the co-occurring classroom discourse, both theoretically and pedagogically.

Supporting Scientific Report Writing in a Chemistry Classroom

Communication skill is one of the competency domains gaining prominence in the twenty-first century. In Singapore, developing students’ literacy and communication skills has been emphasised in all subjects, including science. Despite the emphasis, science teachers have been reluctant to shift the focus from learning content knowledge to including literacy and communication skill teaching in their repertoire. Thus, literacy activities such as reading, writing, and presenting are rarely observed in science classrooms. This study explored and examined scientific report writing activity in a secondary three chemistry classroom in Singapore. A lesson series was codeveloped with a chemistry teacher to infuse literacy activities, especially scientific report writing, in the teaching of the topic of atmosphere. Video data and student-generated group reports were collected and analysed to explore how the teacher taught scientific report writing and the outcomes of the teaching as reflected by student-generated group reports. The findings from this study suggest a need for stronger emphasis on teaching writing in science classrooms.

The Expanding Development of Literacy Research in Science Education Around the World

This introductory chapter summarizes the research background that motivates this book volume and the broad conceptualizations of literacy adopted by the various contributors within the context of science education. It also provides an overview of the six sections in this book, namely (i) national curriculum and initiatives, (ii) content and language integrated learning (CLIL), (iii) classroom literacy practices, (iv) disciplinary literacy challenges, (v) disciplinary literacy and science inquiry, and (vi) teacher development, and summarizes the contributions within each section.

Meeting Disciplinary Literacy Demands in Content Learning: The Singapore Perspective

This chapter examines how systemic language and literacy support for content-area teachers to enhance their students’ learning is realised in Singapore with a focus on science at the secondary level. It highlights theoretical underpinnings that inform the perspective of disciplinary literacy guiding this work and describes how disciplinary literacy is contextualised in Singapore against what is broadly understood as effective communication. It unpacks the nature and extent of systemic support for developing literacy in science with specific reference to the professional learning courses and school-based collaborative research. The chapter addresses the challenges encountered and discusses the implications which impact curriculum and pedagogy in the integration of disciplinary literacy practices to meet students’ needs in the learning of science.

The Content-Language Tension for English Language Learners in Two Secondary Science Classrooms

Investigating the use of native languages (L1) in secondary science remains an unaddressed need in global scientific literacy. While past research in this area has largely focused on primary school students, more clarity is needed on the role of secondary school students’ L1 use in the classroom as the language of science becomes more specialized at a higher level. This chapter details two studies investigating L1 use in secondary science classrooms in New York and Singapore. The study employs qualitative and quantitative methods, including surveys, interviews, observation, and audio recording of student discourse. We find that the L1 can be used for learning scientific content, but is seen by some students as a hindrance to the acquisition of the majority language. This is seen when comparing in-class native language use and data from surveys and interviews. We propose that this reflects a content-language tension that exists in many linguistically diverse science classrooms. This tension highlights competing goals of content learning and acquisition of the majority language. We conclude with a discussion of implications for addressing scientific literacy on a global scale.

Intertextuality and Multimodal Meanings in High School Physics: Written and Spoken Language in Computer-supported Collaborative Student Discourse

Abstract The study in this article examines and illustrates the intertextual meanings made by a group of high school science students as they embarked on a knowledge building discourse to solve a physics problem. This study is situated in a computer-supported collaborative learning (CSCL) environment designed to support student learning through a science inquiry unit enacted in a classroom. As the CSCL environment is intensively mediated by written texts and spoken dialogue, the environment presents a unique opportunity to investigate the relationship between intertextuality and collaborative knowledge-building. Drawing from a dialogic and semiotic perspective of intertextuality, a framework based on systemic functional linguistics was used to analyse the intertextual and multimodal relations between the written and spoken forms of language used to solve the physics problem. Results indicate that in a CSCL environment, the thematic integration of the written and spoken forms of language is critical in the progress of the collaborative inquiry. In particular, written texts provide the contextual meanings to facilitate the students’ collaborative discourse, while spoken language creates new meanings by building bridges across the written texts. The implications of these analyses and findings for classroom discourse as well as potential for future research are discussed.