Developing academic language

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Developing academic language
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• What difficulties do learners in your school
  have with language?

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Key issues

• This is not just an EAL issue formal English
  can be regarded as an additional language for
  many students
• Gaps in academic vocabulary often remain hidden
  due to apparent fluency in spoken or playground
  English
• Without a good range of academic language many
  learners cannot achieve top grades and the vast
  majority will underachieve at some point
• Language acquisition needs to be a structured
  process learners can be taught how to do it
  themselves

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Key features of learners who need attention

• They tend to have more gaps in their academic
  vocabulary and handle certain features of writing
  less confidently
• They have less grasp of idiomatic speech or take
  things more literally than intended
• They tend to lack cultural capital and havent
  been exposed to the diversity of history and
  society critical to achievement
• They are likely to be unfamiliar with the
  conventions and expectations of academic writing

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Key features of learners who need attention

• They may have excellent playground English but
  this is not mirrored in their ability to use
  formal language and genre
• They may slip into a more informal tone for a
  task, when what is required is the adoption of
  formal language
• They may have good topic level knowledge but
  limited capacity to show what they know when
  answering in exams
• They may write answers that throw information at
  a question without actually answering what the
  question requires

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Word frequency and text recognition

• 1,000 most frequently used words give access to
  74 of texts
• Word level tests available through REAL toolkit
• Less than 80 score requires a focused
  intervention to support acquisition

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Diminishing returns to language acquisition
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Language development

• Receptive vocabulary of Yr 9 EAL students who
  have been educated through English for 10 years
  had gaps in the most frequent words and serious
  problems at the 5K level
• Explanation may lie in the nature of the learning
  environment for learners with EAL and the
  possible lack of focused support it provides for
  vocabulary development
• Vocabulary coverage tends not to be planned but
  arises from teaching in curriculum areas
• Intervention by mainstream subject teachers in
  vocabulary development may often be limited to
  simplification of unfamiliar words, rather than
  attending to the need to increase vocabulary size
  or develop deep word knowledge.
• Source Lynne Cameron

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The Academic Word List

• The common core or 2,000 word level offers access
  to 78 of texts
• This does not include much of the formal language
  required for high achievement
• Academic Word List (AWL) relates to the words
  needed by students to access and understand
  academic texts. It comprises 570 word families
  that are not in the common core but which occur
  reasonably frequently over a very wide range of
  texts in many different subjects.
• Learning the AWL will give someone most of the
  language they need for writing across subjects

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Academic Word List

• 570 word families
• Not in the most frequent 2,000 words of English
• Formal (not technical) vocabulary cutting across
  a range of subject disciplines (e.g. authority,
  define, assume, legislate, layer)
• Headword access (family words accessed,
  accessibility, accessing, accessible,
  inaccessible)

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• Subject language

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Composition of QCDA vocabulary for science
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Vocabulary for science by AWL sub-list
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The mother of all flu pandemics

• The flu virus is a survivor. It must continually
  evolve in order to evade its biggest threat - the
  immune system.
• Mammals, including humans, make antibodies, which
  recognise and target the virus. "So it has to
  keep mutating to escape being destroyed,"
  explains David Morens from the US National
  Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
• Despite these tactics, most of the strains that
  make people ill during the eponymous "flu season"
  are sufficiently similar to infections most of us
  have been exposed to before.
• Our immune systems recognise common parts that
  these new strains share with their ancestors, and
  can launch an effective defence.
• Every so often, however, a different strain
  emerges and infects people - one that contains
  new genes from an animal virus.
• Its novelty is its most effective weapon against
  our immune defences. And if it is infectious
  enough to find its way easily into a new host -
  perhaps via an innocent sneeze - it can spread
  rapidly and cause a global epidemic - or
  pandemic.

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What does subject language look like?
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AWL highlighter tool

• The REAL Project has developed a profiling tool
  that enables you to highlight the academic
  language in any electronic text and to research
  its meaning and application. You can find this at
  http//awl.londongt.org.

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Using the AWL highlighter
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Using the highlighter tool
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Word coverage
1k 68
2k 73
AWL 79
Not listed 100 (cumulative)
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Identifying meaning in context
The word global helps us to be accurate in our
understanding of the meaning of epidemic or
pandemic, two science words that have similar but
distinct meanings.
Its novelty is its most effective weapon against
our immune defences. And if it is infectious
enough to find its way easily into a new host -
perhaps via an innocent sneeze - it can spread
rapidly and cause a global epidemic - or
pandemic.

• Try to find a simple match, which helps you to
  establish a fix on meaning
• Check this with other definitions to establish
  that the meaning is correct in the context in
  which the word is used in the text
• Look for a more complex definition that may help
  you to strengthen your ability to use this word

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Identifying meaning in context
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Using the Google define function
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AWL test
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