cross curricular work between english and natural science

Cross Curricular Work on Language and Text Discourse 1

Máster Univ. en Enseñ. Inglés como Leng. Extranj. Espc. Teaching English TL

CROSS CURRICULAR WORK

ON

LANGUAGE AND TEXT DISCOURSE

Máster Universitario en la Enseñanza del Inglés como Lengua Extranjera.

Espc. Teaching English Through Literature

Presentado por:

Dª Mª Raquel Rodríguez Vidal.

Dirigido por:

Dra. ANA HALBACH

Alcalá de Henares, a 23 de septiembre de 2011



INDEX 1. INTRODUCTION Page 5

1. Teaching experience Page 5

1.1 Improving my teaching practice Page 6

1.2 Cross curricular collaboration Page 7

2. LITERATURE REVIEW Page 8

2 Aims of the literature Page 8

2.1 Integration is fundamental in a bilingual education Page 8

2.2 Changing the methodology to avoid fossilisation Page 9

2.3 Transfer is essential Page 10

2.4 Collaboration between departments is the starting point Page 11

2.5 Scaffolding the production of writing in all departments Page 13

3. CONTEXT Page 14

3. Academic achievements Page 14

3.1 The school’s future Page 16

4. THE STUDY Page 17

4. Obstacles to learning Page 17

4.1 The research Page 17

4.2 Tools and data analysis Page 18

5. METHODOLOGICAL INTERVENTION Page 19

5. Analysis of language and text discourse function

in Science 0

5.1 A lack of knowledge transfer on linkers Page 21

5.2 Planning language reinforcement and knowledge

transfer on linkers Page 21



5.3 Text and a lack of knowledge transfer on coherent

sentences Page 23

5.3.1 Planning text reinforcement and knowledge transfer

on coherent sentences Page 24

5.4 Text difficulties and a lack of knowledge transfer

on step by step details Page 24

5.4.1 Implementing text reinforcement and knowledge

transfer on step by step details: the Liz Murray

conference Page 26


transfer on step by step details: using Boy Page 26


transfer on step by step details. anecdotal accounts Page 27

5.5 Implementing text reinforcement and knowledge

transfer: applying PCFA to non-fiction texts Page 29


transfer: applying PCFA to an instructional text 0


transfer: applying PCFA to transactional letters Page 30


transfer: applying PCFA to a travel brochure and

report writing Page 31

5.6 Implementing the writing process used in English

Language lessons to a Science writing reports Page 32



6. RESULTS Page 33

6.1 Student awareness of the conventions of writing:

A questionnaire Page 33

6.2 Student awareness of the importance of knowledge

transfer to other content subjects: the 2nd

Science report Page 35

7. DISCUSSION Page 38

7. Interpreting the results of the questionnaire Page 38

7.1 An analysis of the results of the second Science report Page 39

8. CONCLUSION 1

8. Summarising the issues involved in the ARP Page 41

8.1 Limitations of the study Page 42

8.2 My reflections on the experience Page 43

BIBLIOGRAPHY Page 44

APPENDIX Page 45



1. INTRODUCTION.

1. Teaching experience

My teaching experience has been both varied and rewarding in different ways. I have

been teaching for fourteen years, twelve of which have been in two very different

bilingual secondary schools, in Madrid. The first bilingual school I taught in was a

public school, in La Moraleja1. I taught English applying TEFL methodology. In the

last four years, I have been teaching in a state bilingual school2. I have moved away

from methodology which focuses on teaching English as a foreign language, towards

methodology which centres on teaching English as a first language3; and in particular

teaching academic thinking skills (Zwiers: 2004) through literature. It is an experience

which has made my teaching both meaningful and rewarding.

The rewards of teaching in a bilingual programme are numerable. One of the

most important is that I have not had to use a course book. That freedom has allowed

me to be creative when designing my own resources to teach the content stated in the

bilingual curriculum. In the last four years, I have been able to design schemes of work

which encourage students to analyse and compare, synthesise and interpret both literary

and non literary texts; to design activities to promote academic discussion and

presentations; to involve students actively in deciding the criteria I then use when I

evaluate their work. And finally, I have developed work to enable students to write a

1 I taught at this school from 1998 till 2006. The bilingual groups followed the LOGSE & LOCE

curriculum. This school offered five hours of English a week; and we had to distribute the lessons so that

we taught English using a TEFL course book for three hours a week and an adapted reader for two hours

a week. 2 I have been teaching at my present school from 2007 till the present day. The bilingual groups followed

the MEC/BC curriculum until 2010 when the school voted to transfer to the CAM bilingual progamme. 3 I completed my PGCE (Post Graduate Certificate in Education) in English, at Goldsmith’s college,

University of London. This training helped me to adopt a different methodology to meet the learning

needs of these students through literary texts as opposed to a TEFL coursebook.



variety of text types, applying their previous knowledge of a topic to carry out their

writing tasks4. The results have not always been successful the first time round but by

self evaluating my work and materials I have learnt the importance of scaffolding tasks

by providing vocabulary banks, providing writing frames, doing peer correction,

redrafting and remedial work.

1.1 Improving my teaching practice

As a result of the team work amongst the English teachers who teach bilingual groups,

to a greater or lesser degree, the bilingual students finish the 4th

year of ESO being able

to respond to basic and high level reading questions, and use language to communicate

effectively in their writing and oral production. This awareness of language and the

ability to manipulate it for effect is a skill two of my students in 4 ESO have told me

they have applied to subjects such as Spanish. However, this cross curricular use of a

skill learnt in English lessons then being applied in another subject was not something I

had intentionally planned.

The more able students have applied it instinctively but the less able have not. In

the last four years, content subject teachers, who teach in English, have aired concerns

again and again that from a grammatical point of view, a few less able students reach 4

ESO still not being able to write as accurately (and is some cases as coherently) as they

should. They have also expressed concern that pupils do not always structure their ideas

into clear and logical paragraphs. Since content teachers cannot dedicate their time to

4 Schemes of work, which I have developed, have required students to be creative in launching

advertising campaigns, using texts as a springboard to create new drama scripts/performances and turning

autobiographical accounts into metaphorical poems. These creative tasks required students to apply

various academic thinking skills.



language-related work, it seems to be necessary for the language teacher and the content

teacher to cooperate in this area.

1.2 Cross curricular collaboration

Promoting cross curricular work is not new in legal educational documents and the most

recent references to cross curricular work are in the CAM Advanced Curriculum5. It

mentions the need for English teachers to work with the Spanish department, the

History & Geography department, as well as the Science department. Yet, although it is

not new, in reality, it very rarely happens between departments. And I for one have

never been involved in cross curricular work on language and text discourse with other

content based teachers.

I believe one of the reasons why I want to begin doing cross curricular work is

so that I can create opportunities to show students that what is learnt in one subject can

be applied to another. If I can coordinate the teaching of certain linguistic and discourse

functions, weaker students6 may see learning as meaningful and useful and become

much more involved and motivated in their own learning process.

Another reason is that in the past four years, I have dedicated very little time to

cross curricular work, and this has been due to the fact that all of my free time, these

four years, has been dedicated to material development for my English lessons7. Not

having a course book to follow has given me tremendous freedom to apply my

knowledge and experience in a creative way, while still fulfilling the curriculum

5 The Advanced Curriculum was officially made law in the Orden 2154/2010, 20

th April 2010

6 In our school, even in the bilingual groups, there have always been between 2 to 4 students, in the 2

nd

and 3rd

year of ESO, out of approximately 50, who re-sit the same year because they do not master basic

reading and writing linguistic or/and discourse functions.

7 Using this methodology requires, from an English teacher, hours of work researching and adapting

authentic material from the internet: both written and oral texts; investing one’s own money in ICT and its

corresponding software; not to mention hours spent teaching oneself to use the software.



objectives. However, it has left me with very little time to be able to reflect on how to

improve my teaching practice or plan cross curricular work. Since cross curricular work

makes learning a more positive and meaningful experience for students, this is an aspect

of my teaching I now want to focus on.

I have chosen to focus on 1 ESO A to do this project because I both teach this

group English and I am responsible for coordinating the CAM bilingual programme for

this group. My role as a coordinator has given me the opportunity to sit down with other

teachers, specially the Science teacher, and design ways to help students transfer the

knowledge and skills developed in English to their work to other subjects. The aim of

my project is to work in close collaboration with the Science teacher to encourage

students to transfer language and text knowledge they have acquired in English lessons

to a written task in a Science project

2. LITERATURE REVIEW

2. Aims of the literature

The literature I will present defends the need to integrate language, content and thinking

skills in an English lesson that students can transfer to another content subject.

Moreover, the literature I quote fosters collaboration between teachers from different

departments who teach (in the four skills) in the bilingual section.

2.1 Integration is fundamental in a bilingual education

The integration of language, content and thinking skills should become a key element

when an English teacher plans lessons for a bilingual group. Cummins and Saville-

Troike, when writing about the integration of language and content for ESL students,

stated that ESL programs should not conform to teaching conversational skills but



rather focus on developing the cognitive and academic language proficiency students

required to succeed at school. (Cummins: 1984; Saville-Troike: 1984)

Mohan (1990), when discussing the teaching of LEP8 students, also stated that

second language learning needed to steer away from both teaching language “in

isolation” (113) and “content for language development” (113) and steer towards a

focus on language as the medium of learning and using language for academic purposes.

Though Mohan is referring to LEP students, the theory is equally applicable to bilingual

students.

2.2 Changing the methodology to avoid fossilisation

If bilingual pupils are not being challenged academically, and if they are restricted to

learning grammar or vocabulary through rote exercises, then, there is a possibility of a

student’s language fossilising. Halbach (in press) argues that the English teacher needs

to leave his/her traditional TEFL methodology to one side when teaching bilingual

groups because for one reason, students “‘come with greater exposure to the language

than students from a monolingual education’”. And for another reason, “‘a student

needs to be able to use more linguistic resources than those he has studied ... and part of

the success of a bilingual programme depends on being able to prepare students for this

new challenge’”. This responsibility has been allocated to the English teacher9, who has

to take these needs on board when planning how to teach the Advanced Curriculum to a

bilingual group.

8 LEP is the acronym for: Limited English Proficiency students

9 The CAM Advanced curriculum also states that it is the English teacher’s responsibility to reinforce the

language skills students will need to express themselves in content subjects taught in English.



Halbach (in press) adds that English teachers who limit themselves to using

TEFL methodology in the English lesson, to teach prescriptive grammar, vocabulary

and the other skills, are not catering to their students’ needs. According to this author,

stretching students’ academically means that we must not only design work that

encourages students to experiment and create, but we must also incorporate the

linguistic or discourse functions they will need for other content subjects in our English

lessons. She adds that there is a need to go beyond the teaching of bottom up strategies.

Thus, the English teacher plays a key role in activating and developing top down

strategies that will be needed for other content subjects.

2.3 Transfer is essential

Promoting opportunities for students to actively transfer knowledge is also important in

bilingual teaching. Mohan (1990) argues that that the knowledge structures students

have are not “fixed or static” (119) but “flexible and dynamic” (119) so the transfer of

these knowledge structures is possible and important since “They [knowledge

structures] underlie expository reading and writing, [and are] being realised in discourse

and grammar in a variety of ways, and that students awareness of them improves

retention of subject matter” (133).

Zwiers (2004) also claims that it is important to develop (in students) certain

academic thinking skills in any given subject. His book, entitled Developing Academic

Thinking Skills, categorises 14 academic thinking skills students need to activate in all

subjects. In these four years, I have worked on several of the skills he mentions, with

ESO students, in English10

. Yet, while I have tried to avoid setting tasks which merely

10

I have focused most of my work with students around analysing, comparing, classifying, synthesizing,

communicating, interpreting and evaluating fiction and non-fiction texts.



ask students to recall information, I recognise I have not worked on getting students to

apply what they have learnt to another context. And this is an aspect I planned to work

on.

Jacobs (2010: 9) also states that students need to construct “meaning by making

what she thinks is logical, sensible connection between the new information she reads

and what we already know is stored in knowledge frameworks called ‘schemata’”.

Cross curricular references to help students transfer knowledge in language and

discourse functions is something I propose to do.

What I have taken to be important from the literature cited is that we, the

English language teachers, need to help students not only to interpret different

information sources (for academic purposes) but also to help students apply that

knowledge to other contexts. These two are particularly important not just because

students need to transfer language, linguistic and discourse functions to other content

subjects, but because soon English teachers have to prepare students for external

Cambridge exams in the 2nd

and 4th

year of ESO. Previous experience in preparing

students for external exams has shown me that if they acquire these two skills, they are

more likely to do well in these types of external exams11

.

2.4 Collaboration between departments is the starting point

However, the transfer of knowledge from one subject to another requires collaboration

between teachers from different departments. In his article on knowledge structures,

Mohan (1990) argued that both language teachers and content teachers need to offer

11

It is important to bear in mind that the writing papers, in British external exams (IGCSEs and TEFL

Cambridge exams) our students sit, do not prize recalling skills but test their ability to interpret and

transfer information from one text type to another.



each other “mutual support and cooperation” (113) to integrate language and content in

order to benefit their students.

The Advanced Curriculum has itself much content to cover, and this means that

the English teacher cannot do work on promoting transferring skills alone. As a result,

aiding students to transfer academic thinking skills cannot lie solely on the shoulders of

the English teacher, and will require close team work and co-ordination between one

subject teacher and another.

This close team work is echoed in Halbach’s paper (in press) when she writes

that “there must be close coordination” between the English teacher and the content

subject teachers, for such coordination leads “a student to understand that his/her

learning is not compartmentalised and what is learnt in one subject is relevant to

progress in another”. And this close team work is what I propose to do.

It is also a view which is emphasised by Geoff Barton (n/d), in his article

entitled Stop Calling it Literacy. Barton warns of the dangers of leaving the

responsibility of literacy to one sole person when he comments, “As soon as schools

appoint anyone to be coordinator of anything, it’s easy for other staff to abdicate

responsibility: 'Literacy? – oh, that’s her job.' “ The newly created position of bilingual

coordinators (in CAM bilingual schools) will play a pivotal role if coordinating cross

curricular language and discourse function work between teachers is to be successful.

In his article Barton(n/d) then cites George Sampson’s comment (1922: n/d),

that English teachers are teachers of English’ and that,

If you teach History, then presumably you want your pupils to talk like a

historian, read like a historian and write like a historian. If you teach Science,

then you’ll want the same, expect the same of scientists. It should be the case for



all of us – wanting to create future citizens who know how to speak, read and

write like designers, artists, musicians, historians and scientists.

Hence, an important aim of this project is to share good teaching practice by illustrating

how the Science teacher can scaffold writing in Science so that her pupils’ writing

sounds like a scientist’s.

2.5 Scaffolding the production of writing in all departments

Chamot and O’Malley (1994: 51) also write that, “The teacher should model academic

language. Teachers are experts in using academic language [...]." Their work is aimed at

CALLA teachers, but can be applied to our bilingual programme.

Hence, I aim to coordinate the writing process with bilingual teachers who teach

their content in English. This collaboration will involve scaffolding stages in the writing

process, so that our students see that the writing process carried out in English language

lessons applies to all subjects taught in English. Students will thus view their teachers as

models, “they will hear how we navigate texts and see us demonstrate the process ... it’s

about teachers in all their subjects modelling the skills we routinely use.” (Barton: n/d)

By working in this way, Barton argues that the coordinator is left to do just that,

“to coordinate, support, monitor and report progress – but not to be burdened by the

expectation that it’s her job to ‘do’ literacy on behalf of the school community.”

Swain (1988) also views that the students’ linguistic needs need to be catered for

by content teachers. What is more, he states that this requires the content teacher to

know exactly what language the pupils is expected to know, understand and use; and

include language support in his or her lesson plan so that students use that language in

context.



In this section I have provided the theoretical grounds for the work I have

carried out. During our language lessons my work centred on making students aware

that the language used in English lessons should be applied, when possible to Science

writing. Moreover, I worked on helping students to apply the knowledge they had from

English lessons on text types to their Science writing. Finally, I shared my teaching

practice on scaffolding writing with the Science teacher so that the scaffolding process

students followed in English lessons was not done in isolation but instead was put into

practice when they had to write a Science report.

3. CONTEXT

3. Academic achievements

My school is situated in a middle class area, in the north of the community of Madrid.

The students’ who enrol at our school go on to achieve successful academic results; our

results being above the average set by the CAM educational authorities:



Last year the school celebrated its 25th

anniversary and amongst its many

achievements was the fact that it was one of the first state schools to offer a bilingual

education in Spain; it is a bilingual education that has been offered since 2003/4.

In 2006/7, the first bilingual group were offered the opportunity to sit IGCSE in

the 4th

year of ESO. 37 pupils at all or many of the following exams: English as a first

Language, Spanish, and Geography. All of the students passed, of those 37 students

who sat these exams, the following high marks were obtained: 7 A* grades; 16 A

grades, 27 Bs and 17 Cs. Though the results of all the schools who participate are not

made public, since 2006/7 we have been informed by the Ministry of Education that the

IGCSE marks at our school have been one of the highest of all the MEC/BC bilingual

schools who sit these exams.



3.1 The school’s future

In the last evaluation of the academic year 2009/10, our school voted to opt to become a

Community of Madrid’s bilingual school. Thus, this year, 2010/11, we welcomed our

first linguistic section group, 1st year ESO/A. In total there are 33 students, of which 15

are girls and 18 are boys. In the future, these students will be expected to do two

external exams in English Language12

, and will have the opportunity to continue their

bilingual education until the end of the 2nd

year of Bachillerato.

Academically, their linguistic skills are high. 31 have passed the Cambridge

KET exam (level A2 in the Common European Frame-work of Reference) and 2 have

passed the PET exam (level B1 in the Common European Frame-work of Reference) to

be admitted into this group.

There are two new teachers to the bilingual teaching staff; a Science and a

Physical Education teacher. The teachers who work with this group have high

expectations of their students. They expect to be able to work without too many

misbehaviour problems or learning difficulties as none of the students in the bilingual

section have ever been diagnosed with learning difficulties. All the teachers have passed

the Community’s obligatory English language exam13

making them officially apt to

teach in English at schools. They are all very dedicated professionals, prepared to put in

a great deal of their personal time and effort to make this project work.

12

They will have the opportunity to sit external Cambridge exams at the end of the 2nd

and 4th

year of

ESO.

13 To teach English to a bilingual section, all teachers, both content based and English teachers have to

pass an English language exam set by the autonomous educational authorities. Content based teachers who teach in English are assessed on the four language skills, and the exam is the equivalent of a B2 level, in the Common European Frame-Work of Reference.



4. THE STUDY

4. Obstacles to learning

During a bilingual coordination meeting, in the middle of February, the Science teacher

stated that many students in 1 ESO A had weaker writing skills than she had expected to

find. When I asked her to explain further the group’s failings, she highlighted problems

at word level; the students who were weak had a general inability to use suitable

vocabulary. And at text level, many students found it difficult to write coherent

sentences. Moreover, weaker and average grade students were neither writing a detailed

text, nor a text which looked and read like a science report on an experiment they had

done in class on surface tension.

4.1 The research

These concerns aired by the Science teacher lead me to believe that there was a need to

investigate if specific instructions from the language teacher could aid students to

transfer skills that would improve the quality of their Science writing. To begin with, I

wanted to research if, with teacher based instruction, students applied the linkers we

used in our English subject to their next Science report. Secondly, I wanted to research

if, with further teacher reinforcement work, student peer correction on the cross

curricular language objectives14

ensured students wrote coherent sentences in Science.

Thirdly, I wanted to analyse if the work we had done in the English lessons, to

reinforce detail in writing, and the teacher guidance provided when peer correcting the

14

. In October, during a bilingual meeting, teachers agreed to draw students’ attention to four basic cross

curricular language objectives. They are: subject + verb; tense consistency; 3rd

person singular (present

simple) _____s/es; AUX + (correct form). At the beginning of term, we hung posters in class, of these

cross curricular language objectives, to help teachers draw their students’ attention to them.



task rubric, enabled their writing to be more detailed in Science. And finally, I wanted

to find out if the work we had done on text types in our English lessons in the second

evaluation, was knowledge they transferred, with teacher guidance, when approaching

their Science report in the third evaluation.

4.2 Tools and data analysis

In order to fulfil these aims, I annotated the information and observations made by the

Science teacher during our meetings about 1º ESO’s writing difficulties. I collected in

the students’ first Science reports and studied them to acquire a better understanding of

what the teacher had wanted and what was not being produced by many students. Next,

I planned in my own yearly planner how I would reinforce the language and text

discourse knowledge some students needed remedial work on.

I also asked students to fill out a questionnaire (Appendix XXV). The aim of the

questionnaire was to find out if the group were applying their knowledge on language

and different text types, knowledge they have worked on in English language lessons to

another subject taught in English. I wanted to find out if students were applying linkers

to the writing they had to do in other subjects; if they were being asked to write full

sentences in other subjects and to write texts which were longer than a few sentences. In

other words, I wanted to know if they were being asked to write paragraphs. I also

wanted to find out if they were asked to write detailed accounts in other subjects.

Moreover, I wanted to find out if students were writing other type of texts for other

subjects and if they could label the type of texts they were being asked to produce.

I asked students to complete the questionnaire anonymously, over the weekend,

so that they could write what they honestly knew or did and not what they thought I



would want to know. I hoped this would make the information I would gather much

more reliable. An overview of their answers to this questionnaire can be found under

section 6 entitled, Results. Then, I coordinated another meeting with the Science teacher

to explain how the writing process was carried out in 1 ESO’s language lessons.

Finally, I collected the second Science report writing to analyse the results

(Appendix XVI, XVII, XVIII) and to see if students had transferred language and text

knowledge better in the second Science report than they had done in the first Science

report. The two scientific reports were analysed by focusing on: if students had written

the subheadings they had been asked to write by the Science teacher; if they had written

the number of paragraphs they had been asked to write. I also counted the sentences in

each paragraph; if a sentence was not making a point being asked of them in that

paragraph, I annotated PNM (point not made). In both reports I counted the number of

linkers used to describe their experiment. To end with, I counted the number of

drawings students had included to explain their experiment.

In the first report students were instructed to end their conclusion with a new

question on surface tension. A question related to their experiment on surface tension

that they would like to know the answer to. However, when they were asked to write the

second report they were not asked to write a new question to enquire about mould. Thus

I wrote NA (students were not asked to write about this) in my own notes.

When I compared both reports the criteria I used was that which the Science

teacher had given to her students. I set about reading and recording the number of

subheadings and paragraphs she had asked them to use. The students’ reports had to

have six subheadings in both reports. In the first Science report she expected to see four



paragraphs and in the second report six paragraphs. In both reports she wanted to see

five bullet points under the subheading Materials, listing the equipment used.

I set about reading each paragraph and counted and recorded the number of

sentences which were used to answer each subheading. I also counted and noted the

number of linkers which were used to describe the method of the experiment step by

step. The Science teacher stated she wanted some illustrations to explain the experiment

they had done and I notated the number of drawings included to describe their

experiment.

Needless to say, this cross curricular investigation involved a closer working

relationship with the Science teacher. Hence, I tried to create the opportunities for us to

coordinate and reinforce language or discourse functions that would be beneficial for

students in what remained of this academic year.

5. METHODOLOGICAL INTERVENTION.

5. Analysis of language and text discourse function in Science

During my first one to one meeting with the Science teacher, she explained that they

had done an experiment on surface tension. She went on to comment that once they had

completed the science experiment, she instructed students to write the following

subheadings: Introduction, Materials, Method, Result, Conclusion, Questions. And that

for each subheading they had to write the relevant information regarding the experiment

they had all carried out on the surface tension of water and alcohol.

We then proceeded to analyse all of 1 ESO A’s reports. She pointed to some

samples of work that lacked complete sentences or had grammar usage which was

incoherent. I noted that 16 out of the 30 reports handed in had incoherent grammar



structures or words which simply did not make sense. I also noticed that only 7 out of

the 30 students had included two or more linkers to describe the method of the

experiment. With this knowledge in mind I planned a series of measures to raise

students’ awareness that they could transfer language and text knowledge from one

subject to another.

5.1 A lack of knowledge transfer on linkers

In the first evaluation, in their English lessons, 1 ESO A had worked on linkers of

sequence, so I had expected more students to include them. The Science teacher

explained that under the subheading “Method”, she had not asked for linkers but to

number the stages of the process, and so explain how the experiment took place. I asked

if adding linkers of sequence in their next report would be possible as they have used

them in their writing tasks in English, and she replied that she would not mind asking

students to add them under this subheading.

5.2 Planning language reinforcement and knowledge transfer on linkers

The table below illustrates the measures I took to reinforce the use of linkers in

descriptive texts and how I promoted this language transfer to Science.



What language

knowledge

students needed

to transfer to

other subjects

What material was used to

reinforce language and how

language was reinforced

Where the

material is

found

How language

transfer

awareness was

made

Boy, Reading Comprehension

worksheet.

Appendix I

The use of

linkers of

sequence

A gap fill worksheet on the

autobiographical anecdote ‘Crash

and Smash’.

Appendix II Students were

asked which

other subjects

Recipe texts. Appendix III required the

use of linkers

Transactional letters Appendixes

IV & V

When we finished a chapter on Boy, if the opportunity arose to describe a

sequence of events, as was the case in chapter one, then I asked students to recall and

recount the event using linkers of sequence (Appendix I). When we worked on

recounting autobiographical accounts, the worksheet on my autobiographical account,

entitled ‘Crash and Smash’ (Appendix II) enabled me to recycle linkers of sequence.

Then we worked on recipe writing and students were asked to focus on the importance

of linkers of sequence to describe the process step by step (Appendix III). Finally, when

we worked on informal letters, students were asked to incorporate linkers of sequence to

order the different parts of the question they had to answer (Appendixes IV and V).

During and after all of these tasks, I would ask students to tell me in which other

subjects they could use these linkers, and in what context. This reference to other

subjects in my English lessons is something I had never done before. Many would raise



their hand to answer the subjects these linkers could be used for. They mentioned that

linkers could be used in Science (to describe experiments), Technology (to describe

how engines worked), and in Social Science (to describe how early civilisations

evolved).

5.3 Text and a lack of knowledge transfer on coherent sentences.

The table below illustrates the measures taken to make students aware of the importance

of writing full sentences. They are sentences which must begin with a subject and be

followed by a verb in the correct tense.

What text

knowledge

students

needed to use

in English and

apply to other

subjects

What material was used to

reinforce text knowledge and how

text awareness was reinforced

Where the

material is

found

How text transfer

awareness was

made

The use of

coherent

sentences

(which begin

with a

subject).

And the use of

correct tenses

During and post reading

comprehension questions on Boy

Appendix I

Appendixes

VI and VII

Reference to cross

curricular language

objectives poster.

Students were

asked which other

subjects required

full answers.



5.3.1 Planning text reinforcement and knowledge transfer on coherent sentences.

To tackle the problem of incoherent sentences, in my English lessons I gave

students a reading comprehension after each chapter of Boy that we read, and I insisted

on asking for full sentences. Sentences could not begin with “he/she” or “because”;

instead, they had to begin with the subject followed by the verb in the correct tense

(Appendixes I and VI). To help weaker students, I would ask all students to highlight

the tense in the question before they answered it. Students would then correct the

reading comprehension by checking their answers on the interactive white board. When

they looked at the board they would see that I too had highlighted the tense of the verb

in the question and answers.

I ask them to do this every year, however, this time when we corrected the

answers, I pointed to the cross curricular language objectives poster which was hung up

on their wall and pointed out that this was an objective for all content subjects in

English15

(see Appendix VII). Once again I would elicit if full sentences were necessary

in other subjects, and a few put up there hand to refer to History and Geography.

Observing that nobody had mentioned Science or Technology I asked if they were also

needed there too and one pupil replied that both the Science and Technology teacher

insisted on students writing full sentences.

5.4 Text difficulties and a lack of knowledge transfer on step by step details.

Going back to my sit down session with the science teacher, she had commented that

for many pupils, describing the process in detail, step by step, had been difficult. In fact

15 students had not numbered the process of the experiment but had attempted to write

15

The science teacher would also refer to the poster in her lesson, when they had to do writing tasks in

Science.



a paragraph. 13 out of these 15 had only written two sentences to describe a process

which should have been described in at least six sentences. Only 4 students out of 30

described the process in six stages. Most of the pupils wrote three to four bullet points.

Below is a table explaining the measures which were implemented to reinforce

step by step details in their writing.

What text

knowledge

students

needed to

transfer

What material was used

to reinforce text

knowledge and how text

awareness was

reinforced

Where the material

is found

How text transfer

awareness was

made

An account of the Liz

Murray conference

Appendix VIII

Once the task was

Writing step

by step details

Boy, Mrs. Pratchett’s

Revenge: a chart

Appendix IX corrected I asked

which subjects

required step by

step details.

Autobiographical

anecdotes .

Appendixes: X, XI,

XII, XIII.

Appendix XIV

The majority of the reports lacked step by step details and like the work on

linkers it would take time to get weaker students to apply this knowledge to Science. I

decided to take the two evaluations to make students aware of the need to use linkers

and write detailed accounts before asking the Science teacher to assign a second report.

Weaker students would need to work on many different types of texts to fulfil the

objective I had set on writing step by step details. Consequently, whenever an



opportunity arose (which had not been foreseen in my yearly planner), I asked students

to write detailed accounts of non- fiction writing.

5.4.1 Implementing text reinforcement and knowledge transfer on step by step

details: the Liz Murray conference

One such opportunity to ask students to recount a detailed account occurred

when, 1 ESO A was invited to a conference, in the centre of Madrid. The talk was by

Liz Murray16

. The following lesson, students were asked to recount the most memorable

pieces of information (see Appendix VIII). They initially wrote two to three sentences.

When they put their pens down I asked them to write a further two, followed by a

further two and so on. The conference had lasted 90 minutes; 90 minutes of shocking

and motivating information about Liz Murray’s life. Yet, many had recorded little till

prompted to write more. I mentioned that in secondary school their writing had to be

detailed so that all teachers, not just their English teacher, could understand how much

they had understood about the information in different types of texts. As I have already

mentioned, these references to other content subjects in English is new in my teaching

practice.


details: using Boy.

While reading Boy, a chapter entitled ‘Mrs. Pratchett’s Revenge’,17

enabled us to focus

on step by step detail. Once we had read the moment when the boys get caned, I asked

16

Liz Murray was invited, in March, by Madrid’s educational authorities to talk about her life. She

succeeded in going to Harvard, despite coming from a deprived family background.

17 Mrs. Pratchett was the horrid sweet shop owner. Previous to this chapter, Dahl and his friends had

placed a dead rat in one of Mrs. Pratchett’s sweet jars and scampered off quickly. In this chapter she goes

to the school to insist the Head punishes the culprits with a canning.



them to draw a chart plotting how the tension rises, and to quote words or phrases which

highlight tension (see Appendix IX). I insisted on 7-10 quotes from the text which

suggested tension.

Before they drew their chart, I stood on one side of the room and asked them

how many steps it would take me, physically, to get to the other side of the room. Many

answered seven, ten, more than ten. I asked if I could make it in three steps. All agreed I

could not. So I pointed out that the same was true of all writing tasks they had to do. I

stated that whatever the subject, they had to write many steps and not just two or three. I

finally asked which subjects required ‘step by step’ details and they mentioned: Social

Science, Natural Science and Technology. When I asked what writing required this

detail, one pupil even referred to the Science report they had to write. Then, they began

to draw their ‘Tension Chart’ and look for quotes in pairs. Once the tension chart had

been finished I walked about and observed they had all provided a minimum of seven

quotes.


details: anecdotal accounts

The anecdotal accounts were a way of not only reinforcing work on linkers but also to

emphasise the importance of details in writing that is meant to entertain. The first

anecdote I will explain was a written anecdotal account about a memorable incident

which happened to a parent. Once I had explained the writing rubric, provided a

vocabulary bank, worked on a writing model, and writing frame, 1º ESO A then had to

plan the first draft of their written account (see Appendix X). Having finished the first

draft, I asked them to focus on the paragraph describing the setting. I asked them if it

was a sensual description of the setting. All agreed it could be more sensual so they set



about brainstorming more sensual adjectives to describe the setting (see Appendix XI).

This led to another redraft.

In the next lesson, I asked students to focus on the paragraph where the tension

takes place. They then had to draw a storyboard illustrating the actions leading up to the

dénouement and check if the actions were coherent; they had to focus on not skipping

important actions (see Appendix XII). Having done this, I asked them to add more

details to evoke tension. Once this was completed, they had to redraft their written

account adding in the new information from their storyboard. Once they had come in

with their final draft (see Appendix XIII), I asked them to read the first and last version.

All, except one student, had improved their writing. Once they had finished I asked why

such details were important; the reply by a weak student was to get a higher mark. A

stronger student commented that writing more detailed meant they were answering the

question fully.

The second anecdote, an oral anecdote about their childhood- a pre-secondary

school moment- also reinforced tense consistency and the need for step by step detail.

What was interesting here was that when we were discussing the oral criteria it was the

students who prompted the need to evaluate details (see Appendix XIV). Students

followed the same procedure they had done in the writing task. Once everyone had

retold their anecdote I asked the class if they found the anecdotes interesting. On

affirming that they did, I asked why. Once they had given me the answer I was

expecting, I reminded them that this attention to detail was important in all subjects.



5.5 Implementing text reinforcement and knowledge transfer: applying PCFA18

to

non-fiction texts

To help students become more aware that different texts require different discourse

features would span two evaluations as they had to come into contact with a wider

variety of texts than I had originally planned back in September. In the space of two

evaluations, we managed to work on four different types of text. The chart explains the

text types students worked on to become aware of text discourse features.

What text

knowledge students

needed to transfer

What material was used

to reinforce text

knowledge and how

text awareness was

reinforced

Where the

material is

found

How text transfer

awareness was

made

Knowing and A recipe Appendix XV I asked students in

labelling the

discourse features

in a written text

Transactional letters Appendixes

XVI & XVII

which subjects they

also wrote:

instructions, reports

A travel brochure Appendix

XVIII

And informative

texts.

A formal holiday report Appendixes

XIX & XX

18

I came up with a strategy aimed at helping students become more aware of the fact that different text

types require specific generic features and writing conventions. Once students had read the question

carefully they had to fill out the acronym PFCA.

P stands for the purpose of the text. Is it factual or opinion writing. Are they meant to report? Entertain?

Inform? Recount? Persuade? Instruct?

C stands for content. They have to underline the instructions in the questions and transfer them to this part

of their plan.

F stands for hr features in the text. Are there subheading? Pictures? Bullet points?

A stands for the audience they are writing for. Whom are they writing to? And whom are they meant to be

when they write? This part of the planning stage helped them to remember the text types they were meant

to be producing.



5.5.1 Implementing text reinforcement and knowledge transfer: applying PCFA

to an instructional text

In our language lessons, when students were faced with a reading text, or a piece of

writing to do, they had to PCFA the text before they did anything else. Telling me orally

or writing PCFA on paper would prompt students to think about the text and its

discourse features. In the third evaluation, the class reader, Boy, lead to work on

instructional texts. We analysed the text features of a recipe by completing a PCFA on

the text (see Appendix XV). And this in turn, led to students using the model recipe to

work on their own recipe text and metaphorical recipe poems. I elicited why step by

step details were important in recipe writing and linked the importance of detail to

Science.

5.5.2 Implementing language and text reinforcement and knowledge transfer:

applying PCFA to transactional letters.

In this last evaluation, students also wrote non-fiction letters. We read a writing task

question carefully, together. Then we wrote out the PCFA and planned how to structure

the content being asked for in the rubric. Having planned, we wrote the letter as a class.

This whole class/teacher writing lesson was followed by another letter writing task done

in groups. Then, students carried out a final letter writing task individually (see

Appendixes XVI and XVII). I finished by asking them if they could use this planning

method in other subjects and many put up their hands. One of the answers was a

Science report another mentioned their Technology project.



5.5.3 Implementing language and text reinforcement and knowledge transfer:

applying PCFA to a travel brochure and report writing

The third text pupils analysed was a holiday brochure, which they PCFAed some in

pairs others alone (see Appendix XVIII). We had practised completing a few PCFAs

and students participated actively in providing me with the answers.

Finally, pupils did a piece of report writing in our language lesson before doing

another Science report. The directed writing required students to tether key information

from the class reader and to incorporate it into a report.19

. In the autobiography, Dahl

speaks about his journey to his summer holiday destination and what his summer

holiday on a Norwegian island was like. Together, we wrote a report on the holiday

hotel Dahl stayed at. I explained that we were agents working for the travel company

Thomas Cook, and that our boss wanted us to evaluate if we should write a brochure

advertising the hotel. We began our report filling in PCFA. By this point students were

familiar with how to plan (see Appendix XIX). We then planned and wrote the report

together following the plan step by step (see Appendix XX).

19

Directed writing involves taking content information from one text/source and putting it in another type

of writing. For example, students read a chapter from a novel, and are then asked to tether certain

information to write a diary account, from the perspective of one of the characters in that chapter.



5.6 Implementing the writing process used in English language lessons to a

Science writing report.

Below is a table which outlines the collaboration which took place between the Science

teacher and myself to scaffold the writing process of 1ESO A’s second Science report.

Material to share good teaching practice

in the writing process

Appendix

A writing model on the generic features of a report (which I gave

to the Science teacher).

XXI

A worksheet outlining the writing process in English (which I

explained and gave to the Science teacher)..

XXII

Science vocabulary bank worksheet for the second report. The

vocabulary on the left hand side was my contribution. The word

bank on the right hand side was the Science teacher’s word bank.

XXIII

The Science teachers report writing rubric XXIV

The Science teacher’s reflections on the writing process. XXV

Hence, to analyse if students’ were transferring writing skills from English to Science,

the Science teacher set another report task. Yet, before asking students to write the

report, the Science teacher and I sat down together, during a bilingual coordination

meeting, and I explained the writing process I followed in English. I handed her the type

of model writing example I gave students (see Appendix XXI) as a source of reference

to understand the type of text discourse they would be asked to reproduce. And I added

that I often did a whole class writing with them (time permitting). A whole class writing

task was a chance to show students a step by step explanation of how the writing

process should take place. I also explained that it was particularly useful in scaffolding

the learning process for weaker students who do not usually know how to fulfil all the



aspects of a writing task. The following day after our meeting I handed her a word bank

of words I thought would be useful for students to have when they came to writing their

second report. The Science teacher improved this word bank with more specific

scientific words (see Appendix XXIII).

Thus, before students handed in their report, they were given a rubric (see

Appendix XXIV) and detailed instructions on how to write their report. They were

provided with a vocabulary bank and they were asked to plan PCFA. Once the writing

process had finished, she wrote a summary on how the writing process had gone in class

(see Appendix XXV).

6 RESULTS.

6. Student awareness of the conventions of writing: a questionnaire

A questionnaire was handed out before the second report was written to find out if

students transfer knowledge on their use of language and text discourse functions to

other subjects. 30 out of 33 students handed in their questionnaire, which was filled in

anonymously.



QUESTIONS REPLIES out of

30 questionnaires

1.1 Students who answered they use linkers in other

subjects taught in English.

77%

1.2 Students who affirmed they use at least one linker in:

Science

Geography & History

Technology

70%

60%

33%

2.1 Students who wrote full sentences in other subjects

taught in English.

100%

2.2 Students who replied always writing full sentences in:

Science

Geography & History

Technology

70%

40%

40%

3.1 Students who stated they write paragraphs for other

subjects.

93%

3.2 Students who replied they wrote paragraphs for the

following subjects:

Science

Geography & History

Technology

56%

70%

37%

4.1 Students who claimed they had to write step by step

details in other subjects taught in English?

70%

5.1 Types of writing students said they had done in Science.

Report

Explain (a process)

Instruct

Recount

Inform

30%

33%

7%

3%

17%

6.1 Types of writing students said they had done in

Geography & History:

Report

Explain

Instruct

Recount

Inform

23%

7%

3%

17%

37%

7.1 Types of writing done in Technology:

Report

Explain

Instruct

Recount

Inform

63%

7%

9%

0%

18%



6.1 Student awareness of the importance of knowledge transfer to other content

subjects: the 2nd

Science report on Mould.

Two evaluations later, students were given another Science report to do. Below

is a chart of the results from the first report, in the 1st evaluation, on water tension, and

the second report, in the 3rd

evaluation, on mould. The mark was awarded on how

detailed an explanation students had given on the procedures carried out to do the

experiment. There were also marks on the format. In other words, if it looks like a

report and if they had included all the subheading they were asked to do.

Hence, below are the results of the 25 students (out of 3320

) who handed both of

their reports in. They have been grouped according to their performance: 6 out of 25 had

not improved; 3 students remained in the same mark; 8 out of 24 students had improved

by one mark; and 8 students improved by two or more marks.

20

As 8 of the students had not handed in both reports; they had either handed in one or the other. One

student had not handed in either of the two. Thus, I could not compare their work. The two most

common reasons in 1 ESO A were: a lack of organization to do work in an allocated time and a lack of

understanding that coursework is equally important when evaluating a students work as a written exam.



NAME 1st Science report 2nd Science report

NATALIA 6 5

ALBERTO 7 5

FERNANDO 7 5

LUCÍA.T. 7 6

AITOR 8 6

Students whose grade went down.

MARINA 10 9

Students whose grade remained the same.

SERGIO 4 4

Students whose grade went up one mark.

CRISTINA 7 7

Students whose grade went up two or more marks.

NURIA 7 7

PABLO 5 6

ÁLVARO 5 6

VICTORIA 5 6

PATRICIA 6 7

RODRIGO 6 7

RAQUEL 6 7

ENRIQUE 7 8

CRISTINA 8 9

PEDRO 2 8

ANA 4 7

MIGUEL 4 6

JORGE 4 6

ROCÍO 5 7

HELENA 6 8

DAVID 6 8

LORENA 7 9

Two types of detailed charts recording student’s first and second reports can be found in

Appendix XXVII and XXVIII. A summary of the results I gathered can be seen in the

following chart. The parts shaded in green are the parts that I had worked on the most

throughout the second and third evaluations in our English language lessons.



Cross Curricular language &

discourse function analysis Average of the (*) Percentage of students that

1st report 2nd report improved went down no change

1.- Number of subheadings

written

4,96 5,48 68% 8% 24%

2.1.- Number of paragraphs

written

79% 88% 40% 36% 24%

2.2.Number of sentences in

paragraph:

One “Introduction” 1,44 2,52 68% 20% 12%

Three “Method” (step by step) 3,44 4,56 60% 16% 24%

Four “ Result” 1,06 3,92 68% 8% 24%

Five “Analysis”

Six “Conclusion” 0,76 2,48 80% 0% 20%

“New question”

2.3.- Number of bullet points

under paragraph two, subheading

“Materials”.

4,24 4,40 28% 28% 44%

3.- Number of linkers used 1,12 3,24 84% 8% 8%

4.- Number of drawings included 1,36 2,20 56% 20% 24%

(*) In the case of number of paragraphs the percentage is shown of the results obtained because in each report the

number of paragraphs students were asked to write was different



7. DISCUSSION

7. Interpreting the results on the questionnaire

The results gathered from the questionnaire illustrate that in the last two evaluations,

77% of students have been aware of the need to apply the use of linkers to other

subjects. What is more, 70% stated they have applied linkers to their writing in Science.

Science was the subject they replied they most used linkers in their writing. I found this

interesting as the Science teacher and I have made repeated references to each other’s

subjects and the need to use linkers in all writing tasks. And I believe this is reflected in

the fact that 70% stated they used linkers in Science.

All stated they were required to write in full sentences in English, which as you

can see from the English exercises in the appendix is the case. The next subject students

replied was Science (with 70%). I think the result of this to be the coordination and

cross references we have made orally to the importance of writing full sentences in our

lessons.

70% stated writing step by step details when they were asked to, but they were

unable to tell me exactly when they have had to do that. When I later asked them orally

to explain when they wrote details the replies were varied: “in Geography to explain the

weather”, “in Science to explain experiments”, “in Technology to explain about

engines”.

Fewer students were able to pinpoint the two types of writing they had done in

Science. 30% stated they had done report writing and 33% explanatory writing. I

believe the reason for this to be that they are still not familiar with all of the types of

writing they will have to do in secondary school. The fact is that before this

questionnaire the only report they had done in Science was back in the autumn. They



lack the experience of doing several examples of the same type of writing in different

subjects. This is why I think they find it difficult to recall and classify the different types

of writing they do. Considering that they barely practice different types of writing in

different subjects, I am surprised even 30% were able to recall that they wrote a report

six months previously. Hence, in my questionnaire the part asking them to recall the

types of writing they do in other subjects had the weakest answers.

One detail I found interesting was that no one mentioned doing persuasive

writing. This was reassuring as it isn’t a type of writing any teacher has asked them to

do this year and thus was an indication that they were not putting willy-nilly answers

down.

7.1 An analysis of the results on the second Science report

Once I had compared the second piece of writing to the first, what struck me initially

was the number of linkers I came across in context. 84% of the 25 students who had

handed in their second Science report had improved in the number of linkers they

incorporated to describe the procedures in their mould experiment. The linkers had

mostly been used under the sections on Method, where 22 out of 25 had used more

linkers than in their previous report, and in their paragraph entitled Results. The chart

shows that the average number of linkers used in the 1sr report was 1,12 and in the

second report the average had gone up to 3,24. As I have previously mentioned under

the section on The Study, when I worked on a piece of writing in English I often made

cross references to other subjects and the need to use linkers in their writing, so seeing

evidence of this was pleasing.

Another striking difference was that the number of sentences used to write the

report had increased. In the introduction 68% of the reports had more sentences



explaining the aims of the report. When they wrote their 1st report there was no written

rubric. However, when they were asked to write their 2nd

report they had a rubric

(Appendix XXIV) and followed it more carefully. 60% had increased the number of

sentences they had used to describe the method step by step. 68% had provided more

sentences to describe the results when allowing bread to develop into mould. Overall,

what struck me about these two paragraphs was that the sentences were nearly always

coherently written sentences and the sentences followed each other cohesively. Having

a rubric to follow and the continuous reminders during our English lessons to write

more detailed accounts helped 16 students to improve the quality of their reports (see

samples of students progress in appendixes: XXXIX, XXX, XXXI, XXXII).

What was significant was that in the first report, there were many students who

had (PNM) points not made – in other words sentences which made no sense. To be

more precise 6 students had 1 PNM in their report, 5 students had 2 PNM comments, 4

students had 3 PNM comments, 2 students has 4 PNM comments. However, in the

second report only 1 student had 1 PNM and 1 student had 2 PNM comments. Students

obviously improve as the academic year comes to an end but I believe these results are

due to the fact that they are asked to write a great deal in English and this thus has a

positive influence in their writing in other subjects.

All of the reports I read followed the generic features of a report more clearly.

They were more detailed and had included all of the subheading in the rubric and more

illustrations than in the 1st report. In fact the illustrations had improved by 56%. I

believe this could be due to the fact that they had had more practice writing reports in

English and in thinking about the features they had to include when they filled in their

PCFA plan.



Despite the improvement in many of the students’ reports, six students had lower

grades than in their 1st report. When I asked these students why they thought their grade

was lower the replies were varied. One student felt being in this group was too difficult

and in the second and third evaluation she just lost interest in working harder to get

better marks. Two commented that by the end of the year they had to spend time

studying for end of year exams and could not spend as much time on the 2nd

report.

They also added that by the end of the year they did it just well enough to pass. Three

students have acquired the same mark, 4, 7, 7. The students who had obtained the 4/10

remarked that “they were not sure why they got that mark”, implying they didn’t really

understand what was being asked of them. Of the other two one replied that they had

other exams to prepare and just did not realize he had to write more than in the first

report.

8. CONCLUSION.

8. Summarising the issues involved in the ARP

My action research project focused on helping 1º ESO A students to transfer knowledge

they have acquired in English language writing tasks to their Science writing tasks. I

particularly wished to see if and how students transferred their language knowledge on

linkers, on writing complete sentences, and detailed texts to Science. What is more, I

wanted to see if and how they transferred their knowledge on text discourse functions.

My research required coordination meetings with the Science teacher to analyse

students’ first and second report writing tasks in Science. I also asked students to

answer a questionnaire so that I could find out how aware they were of the need to

transfer knowledge from one subject to another. Moreover, I spent most of the second

and third evaluation designing tasks in our English lessons to help pupils transfer the



knowledge needed to complete their writing tasks in other content subjects, especially

Science.

8.1 Limitations of the study

I came across two clear difficulties during this research project. As this was the first

time I had designed a questionnaire, I was over ambitious in the questions I asked such

young students. Therefore not all of the replies on texts were as useful as I would have

wanted them to be. What is more, though the questionnaire was anonymous, and given

to them to complete over the weekend, some of the replies seemed to be information

they thought I would have wanted to read, rather than truthful answers.

Secondly, finding time to coordinate with the Science teacher was difficult as we

did not coincide during our non teaching periods or break time duties. So when we did

eventually meet in order that I could explain the writing process we followed in English

lessons I did not explain the stages of peer correction clear enough. And there was no

time after that meeting to clarify doubts as she had to finish this task to begin end of

year exams. As the peer correcting process was new to her it did not go as well she had

hoped. So it was not as beneficial a learning experience as it could have been for

students.

8.2 My reflections on the experience.

Cross curricular work has proven to be difficult but not impossible. The Advanced

Curriculum requires English teachers to cover much content and yet we cannot rush

through this content as first year students need time to adapt to secondary school.

Bearing this in mind, I did not think it realistically possible or fair that it should be the

English language teacher who should reinforce language issues in her/his lesson so that

students improve their writing process in other content subjects. Having said this, the

ARP has enabled me to see that it does not have to be a case of the Science teacher says



they can’t construct passive sentences so let’s give them a photocopied exercise on the

passive from an English grammar book.

Not all students transfer knowledge naturally from one subject to another, and

many do need teachers to help them do this. Hence, incorporating language and text

discourse work into an English teacher’s scheme of work is essential if more students

are to perform to the best of their ability in secondary school. However, it takes a great

deal of time to do. I believe it is best done when English teachers have had several years

of experience in teaching English to bilingual students using a different methodological

approach to the TEFL approach most teachers use.

I found that transferring knowledge on text discourse functions was the most

difficult part as few content teachers are inclined to vary the writing tasks they set. Thus

making this last aim the hardest and longest to implement. In an ideal situation all

teachers in a bilingual team would have more time to coordinate and discuss how to

reinforce language and coordinate more writing tasks on a text type together to promote

knowledge transfer on texts. As well as having huge posters (in each classroom)

illustrating different text types and their corresponding vocabulary banks in a way that

appealed to visual learners.

If cross curricular coordination is to be successful, it requires content based

teachers willing to trust English teachers, willing to explain and share the work they do

with their students, and a readiness to leave one’s comfort zone and take risks; by this I

mean changing one’s methodological techniques. I was fortunate enough to work with a

Science teacher prepared to do all of this.

To conclude, the experience has been useful because it has enabled me to find

out what is being asked of students in other subjects taught in English. Knowing and

understanding better what is being asked of students means that I can better adapt my



lessons to cross curricular needs and to continue helping students transfer the

knowledge they have to other content subjects. .

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Barton, G. 2010. Stop calling it literacy. Available on line from

http://www.teachit.co.uk/custom_content/newsletters/newsletter_oct10.asp#1; last

accessed on Sunday, 19th

June 2011

A Teacher friendly conceptual map of Bloom’s Revised Taxonomy. Available on-line

from http://www.kurwongbss.eq.edu.au/thinking/Bloom/blooms.htm;. last accessed on

Sunday, 19th

June 2011.

http://www.teachit.co.uk/custom_content/newsletters/newsletter_oct10.asp#1

http://www.kurwongbss.eq.edu.au/thinking/Bloom/blooms.htm



APPENDIX I

REINFORCING THE USE OF LINKERS AND COHERENT SENTENCES:

2nd

Evaluation. Reading Comprehension questions on the class reader Boy, Tales of

Childhood.

The during and post reading worksheet



A student’s exercise book with the reading comprehension worksheet answered.



APPENDIX II

2nd

Evaluation. Reinforcing the use of linkers. This worksheet is my own

autobiographical recount. After I recounted the incident, orally, students were

asked to activate vocabulary I used and we had studied and linkers – by putting

them in the gaps.



The first recipe is an example of a student writing a recipe and explaining the steps using linkers. The second text is a metaphorical poem, which respects the discourse features of a recipe – which require step by step details and linkers.

APPENDIX III



APPENDIX IV

3rd

Evaluation. The following three writing tasks, imitating writing question 1, in

the First Certificate Exam, lend themselves well to reminding students to transfer

linkers to other text types they will have to write.

This p

lan w

as do

ne to

gether; I w

as able to

do

it

with

them

on

the in

teractive w

hiteb

oard

.



APPENDIX V

A whole class model writing based on the information we wrote on the plan.



APPENDIX VI

3rd

Evaluation. A worksheet on a reading comprehension on Boy. I reinforced sentence and tense coherence. Students are repetitively

asked to highlight the tense in the question to make sure the answer is in the correct tense. (answers must begin with subject + verb; verb

in the correct tense).



APPENDIX VII

These are the cross curricular language objectives the bilingual teachers agreed to focus on with students both in their written and oral

texts.



APPENDIX VIII

STEP BY STEP EXPLANATION REINFORCEMENT THROUGH NON-

FICTION RECOUNTS AND THE CLASS READER BOY.

2nd

Evaluation. A Writing account of the Liz Murray Conference students

attended. This was an opportunity to describe step by step details.



APPENDIX IX

2nd

Evaluation. The scene in Boy when the boys, including Dahl, are canned was an

ideal opportunity to get students to focus on the importance of detail to create

tension.



APPNEDIX X

2nd

Evaluation. Student’s first account has little detail regarding the setting.



APPENDIX XI

Planning and redrafting to add more sensual details to the setting.



APPENDIX XII

2nd

Evaluation. Students were asked to draw a storyboard on an anecdotal account of a parent’s childhood experience , paying attention

to the details which would build up tension; and use linkers in context.



APPENDIX XIII

The final draft with much more detail in the opening setting and the moment of

tension.



APPENDIX XIV

2nd

Evaluation. When students and I negotiated the oral assessment criteria (for

their autobiographical anecdote); a student suggested we needed to assess correct

use of past tenses and attention to detail, and the rest agreed so it was added.

Peer evaluation of the oral childhood anecdote. When students’ peer evaluated the

oral anecdotes they looked out for those aspects.

Mª Raquel Rodríguez Vidal Action Research Project: Cross Curricular Work

Máster en Teaching English Through Literature 61

APPENDIX XV

TYPES REINFORCEMENT WORK on IDENTIFYING & IMITATING DIFFERENT TEXT

3rd

Evaluation. Once we had finished reading a scene in Boy, when Dahl refers to memorable food he ate while on holiday, in Norway, students

were asked to fill in PCFA on this worksheet; )a non-fiction piece of writing) recipes. This led to metaphorical recipe poems.

.



APPENDIX XVI

A group plan which led to a group letter writing activity.



APPENDIX XVII

A plan done individually

before writing the letter.



APPENDIX XVIII

3rd

Evaluation. This reading comprehension on brochures was another opportunity to

pay attention to text features and analyse the features of this text by filling in PCFA.



APPENDIX XIX

3rd

Evaluation.

This was the last piece of

writing we did; in

coincided with the time

they had to write their

second Science report.

This group report writing

question, was a directed

writing task to take

information from Boy and

to place in another text

type.

Planning PCFA together

helped students to

remember the text features

they needed and to tether

details from the class

reader to the report



APPENDIX

XX

This was the

model group

report we

began

together after

planning and

they finished

in groups



APPENDIX XXI

SUPPORT MATERIAL FOR THE SCIENCE TEACHER TO USE WHEN GIVING THE 2nd

SCIENCE REPORT WRITING TASK.

2nd Evaluation; after viewing the 1st Science reports. I provided a writing model on how I plan helped to explain the writing process in English lessons.



APPENDIX XXII

3rd

Evaluation. I gave the Science teacher an outline of the procedures I use when I ask

students to write longer pieces of work on English.



MY SUGGESTED VOCABULARY BANK THE SCIENCE TEACHER’S IMPROVED VERSION TO HAND TO STUDENTS

This version helps students to model a scientists

way of expressing him/herself.

APPENDIX XXIII

Once the Science teacher explained the possible report she could set 1 ESOA, I gave a possible vocabulary bank to scaffold the writing of the report. She came

up with a better alternative…



APPENDIX XXIV

THE SCIENCE TEACHER’S WRITING RUBRIC; EXPLAINED TO STUDENTS.



APPENDIX XXV

THE SCIENCE TEACHER’S REFLECTIONS ON THE WRITING PROCESS IN

HER SUBJECT.

The science teacher kindly wrote an evaluation of how the writing process went in class

and her model writing/ tips for students.



APPENDIX XXVI

This was the questionnaire handed out to 1 ESO A to find out if they had been applying the language and text type knowledge learnt in English

language lessons to other content subjects taught in English.



APPENDIX XXVII

A chart comparing each student’s language and text discourse performance in the first and second Science report writings.

Miguel Ana

Cross Curricular language & discourse

function analysis

1st Science Report 2

nd Science Report 1

st Science Report 2

nd Science Report

1 Number of subheadings 6/6 6/6 6/6 6/6

2.1 Number of paragraphs 3/4 6/6 2/4 6/6

2.2 Number of sentences in paragraph:

One “Introduction”

Three “Method” (step by step)

Four “ Result”

Five “Analysis”

Six “Conclusion”

“New question”

2

1

0

NA

1(PNM)

1(PNM)

2

5

5

2

2

NA

2

3

0

NA

1

1 (PNM)

3

8

5

3

3

NA

2.3 Number of bullet points under

paragraph two, subheading “Materials”.

3/5

5/5

4/5

5/5

3 Number of linkers 0 4 2 5

4 Number of drawings 2 2 2 2

PNM= Point not made/ the rubric has not been answered.

NA= Students were not asked to write about this subheading in the report.



Victoria David


discourse function analysis


nd Science Report 1

st Science Report 2

nd Science Report






Four “ Result”

Five “Analysis”


“New question”

1(PNM)

3

1 (PNM)

NA

1

1(PNM)

2

3

5

3 (PNM)

5

NA

1

2

0

NA

1

0

2

4

3

6

2

NA


paragraph two, subheading

“Materials”.

4/5

5/5

4/5

4/5







Lorena Helena




nd Science Report 1

st Science Report 2

nd Science Report






Four “ Result”

Five “Analysis”


“New question”

1

2

1

NA

2

0

3

6

4

6

3

NA

2

3

1

NA

1 (PNM)

2(PNM)+ 1

3

4

5

5

2

NA



“Materials”.

0/5

6/5

3/5

5/5







Sergio Cristina




nd Science Report 1

st Science Report 2

nd Science Report

1 Number of subheadings 4/6 5/6(not clear) 5/6 1/6





Four “ Result”

Five “Analysis”


“New question”

2

1(PNM)

1(PNM)

NA

1(PNM)

1(PNM)

3

3

0

0(PNM)

1(PNM)

NA

2

5

1

NA

1

1 (PNM)

1

3

1

1

2

NA



“Materials”.

4/5

4/5

4/5

4/5







Alberto Pablo




nd Science Report 1

st Science Report 2

nd Science Report






Four “ Result”

Five “Analysis”


“New question”

2

2

0

NA

1

1

1

4

1

0

1

NA

1(PNM)

4

2

NA

1

0

3

4

1

1

3

NA



“Materials”.

4/5

4/5

5/5

4/5







Patricia Natalia




nd Science Report 1

st Science Report 2

nd Science Report






Four “ Result”

Five “Analysis”


“New question”

3

6

1

NA

1

1

2

6

8

6

3

NA

1(PNM)

3

1

NA

1

0

3

4

3

2

2

NA



“Materials”.

7/5

5/5

4/5

5/5







Marina Rocío




nd Science Report 1

st Science Report 2

nd Science Report






Four “ Result”

Five “Analysis”


“New question”

6

9

3

NA

3

1

3

6

9

6

5

NA

2(PNM)

3

2(PNM)

NA

0

1 (PNM)

2

5

9

4

2

NA



“Materials”.

6/5

4/5

4/5

6/5







Aitor Rodrigo




nd Science Report 1

st Science Report 2

nd Science Report






Four “ Result”

Five “Analysis”


“New question”

2 (PNM)

4

2

NA

1

1(PNM)

4

3

2

2

1

NA

1 (PNM)

2 (PNM)

1

NA

1 (PNM)

1 (PNM)

2

4

6

4

5

NA



“Materials”.

4/5

3/5

5/5

5/5







Alvaro Cristina




nd Science Report 1

st Science Report 2

nd Science Report






Four “ Result”

Five “Analysis”


“New question”

1(PNM)

4

2

NA

1(PNM)

0

2

5

2

1

1

NA

2

3

2

NA

1

1

2

4

5

4

4

NA



“Materials”.

4/5

4/5

5/5

5/5







Raquel Fernando




nd Science Report 1

st Science Report 2

nd Science Report






Four “ Result”

Five “Analysis”


“New question”

2

2

1

NA

2(PNM)

1(PNM)

3

4

4

7

3

NA

3

5

2

NA

1

0

3

5

2

2 (PNM)

1

NA



“Materials”.

4/5

4/5

5/5

4/5


4 Number of drawings 1(PNM) 2 0 1





Pedro Jorge




nd Science Report 1

st Science Report 2

nd Science Report






Four “ Result”

Five “Analysis”


“New question”

1(PNM)

4

2

NA

0

1(PNM)

4

5

6

3

2

NA

0,5(PNM)

6

0,5

NA

0

1 (PNM)

3

4

0

0

2

NA



“Materials”.

4/5

3/5

4/5

4/5







Lucía Nuria




nd Science Report 1

st Science Report 2

nd Science Report






Four “ Result”

Five “Analysis”


“New question”

1

2

1

NA

2

1(PNM)

2

5

4

3

4

NA

3

6

2

NA

1

1

2

6

2

2

1

NA



“Materials”.

4/5

4/5

7/5

4/5







Enrique




nd Science Report

1 Number of subheadings 6/6 6/6

2.1 Number of paragraphs 4/4 6/6




Four “ Result”

Five “Analysis”


“New question”

2

4

1

NA

0

1

3

4

6

2

3

NA



“Materials”.

4/5

4/5

3 Number of linkers 1 5

4 Number of drawings 1 2





APPENDIX XXVIII

Charts comparing the group’s performance on different aspects of the report writing.



APPENDIX XXIX

Sample of a student’s 1st Science report, in the 1

st Evaluation; mark: 4/10



3rd

Evaluation. The same student. The 2nd

Science report. The student with a previous 4/10, now acquired a 6/10.

cross curricular work between english and natural science

Documents