Pedagogic discourse in the primary school

LINGUISTICS

AND EDUCATION

7, 221-242

( 1995)

Pedagogic Discourse in the Primary School FRANCES

CHRISTIE

Universit?: of Melbourne

A pedagogic discourse involves the operation of a set of principles by which persons are apprenticed into ways of working valued in a culture. The term pedagogic discourse is taken from Bernstein (1990) although adapted to accommodate a linguistic description. A pedagogic discourse is realized in two sets of language choices: (a) those of a first order or regulotive register, having to do with the goals, purposes, and directions of the teaching-learning activity and (b) those of a second order or instructional register, having to do with the “content” to be taught and learned. The operation of the former register determines the operation of the second. Examination of the manner in which the two registers function to create the pedagogic discourse allows us to demonstrate both how subject positions are constructed in the discourse and how students develop an understanding of the “common knowledge” (Edwards & Mercer 1987) of a culture.

This article argues a model of classroom discourse and its analysis in terms of sets of language choices, the nature of which changes over the course of a series of lessons, as a necessary aspect of successful teaching and learning. The method of analysis proposed defines the discourse at issue as pedagogic, a term taken from Bernstein (1990). The operation of such discourse is said to be fundamentally involved in the building of pedagogic subjects: persons who both participate in the construction of the discourse and who are shaped by it. As persons participate in the construction of such a discourse, it is argued, so too are they enabled to enter into possession of the “common knowledge” of a culture, of the kind which was discussed, for example, by Edwards and Mercer (1987). In order to demonstrate how a pedagogic discourse works, it is necessary to study quite long-sustained sequences of lessons. This is because the various practices involved in the very complex processes by which students enter into shared knowledge and understandings, as well as demonstrate capacity to manipulate these things in reasonably independent ways, involve considerable time. Moreover, as a careful analysis of the matter reveals, there are significant shifts over time in the manner in which language is used by both teacher and students,

The research reported in this article was funded by the National Languages and Literacy Institute of Australia. Correspondence and requests for reprints should be sent to Frances Christie, Department of Language, Literacy, and Arts Education, University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria 3052, Australia.

221

222

F. Christie

all of them important evidence of the cumulative sense in which pedagogic discourse construction works, building incrementally as students move toward achievement of important goals. In that the method used in this article argues the need for examination of quite long sequences or cycles of lessons it adopts many of the principles proposed by contributors to a recent Special Issue of Linguistics und Educatiorz (devoted to the study of discourse and edited by Green blr Dixon, 1993). Brilliant-Mills ( I993), for example, in a discussion of the teaching and learning of mathematics, reported a “theoretical decision” to record a series of complete cycles of lessons “from inception . through closure” (p. 30X). In the same Special Issue, Lin ( 1993, pp. 32-33) reported a similar decision to record cycles ot lessons in studying the language of seventh-grade English classes. Heras (1993, p. 276), studying the construction of understanding in a sixth-grade bilingual classroom, recorded that data collection took place over 2’/~_ months in which the object was to explore how knowledge was constructed over a sustained period of time. There are a number of themes at issue in the methodologies proposed by the various contributors to the Special Issue, as well as in other recent sources all of which are worth foregrounding, for their relevance to the discussion to be developed later. One is a recognition of the social construction of experience that is a fundamental feature of classroom life. Another is the recognition-partly ethnographic and partly sociolinguistic (see Cazden, 1986, for a useful discussion)-of the role of talk in generating a sense of the routines or rules that appear to govern classroom behavior, as well as generating a sense of the values students are intended to acquire in order to participate in classrooms. Green and her colleagues (Green & Dixon, 1993; Green Br Kantor-Smith, 1988; Kantor, Green, Bradley, & Lin, 1992) made notable contributions to research in the latter sense. Another theme 01 relevance to this discussion is the recognition of the nature of language as “text” (Halliday & Hasan, 1989): that fundamental linguistic resource in which clasaroom meanings are negotiated and constructed. often through very complex interplays of spoken and written texts, where these in turn interact with the various nonverbal texts used as resources in the classroom. All of these themes inform the methodology outlined in this article, although the discussion aims to make a distinctive contribution in several senses. First, it is argued that the pedagogic discourse that constitutes the focus of the discussion is constructed in instances of particular lessons termed curriculum genres (Christie. 1989). Second, it is argued that the overall cycles of such genres should be thought of as c,urriculum nzacrogenres (Christie, 1994. in press). A curriculum genre is socalled because, like other instances of genres in language, it represents “a staged. goal-oriented social process” (Martin, Christie, & Rothery, n.d., p. S9)-in this case one having pedagogic goals. The term curriculum macrogenre is adopted because it is intended to capture the notion of the sequence of curriculum genres that actually constitute the activity. Third, using Halliday’s (1994) functional grammar, it is argued that it is in the operation of a curriculum macrogenre that WC can see at work those linguistic resources in which students are apprenticed into behaviors, skills. attitudes, procedures. and forms of knowledge which enable

Pedagogic Discourse

223

them to achieve particular pedagogic subject positions, and hence, to acquire aspects of the “common knowledge” that is an important part of schooling. In order to develop the discussion and explain how the method of analysis works, I propose to outline at least aspects of Bernstein’s work with respect to pedagogic discourse. I then propose to demonstrate how Halliday’s functional grammar is used to uncover the nature of a pedagogic discourse by reference to a short extract from an early childhood curriculum genre. Finally, I propose to illustrate the operation of the pedagogic discourse in one instance of a curriculum macrogenre drawn from an upper primary social science classroom. I argue that the analysis demonstrates how the nature of the pedagogic discourse shifts over time and how those shifts facilitate and make possible the eventual adoption by students of appropriate pedagogic subject positions. PEDAGOGIC

DISCOURSE

As previously noted, the notion of a pedagogic discourse draws particularly on the work of Bernstein (1986, 1990, 1994). The term pe&gogic discourse is intended to capture more than the conventional notion of a classroom discourse, at least as that is reflected in most work on the subject. Primarily, it is intended to capture a sense of the social practices involved in educational activities, and, quite fundamentally, the principle or principles that determine the structuring or ordering of these in which both of these are realized in distinctive patterns of classroom text construction. Through an analysis of such principles, I would argue, the study of a pedagogic discourse allows us to examine the nature of the pedagogic subject or the pedagogic person that is constructed in the discourse. Bernstein (1994) made clear that the term pedagogic discourse is used to cover a broader range of relationships and situations than those within schools: It covers the relationship of psychiatrist and patient, of prison warden and prisoner, and of doctor and patient, for example. However, the concern here is with those relationships that involve teacher and student. In offering a definition of pedagogic discourse, Bernstein (1990) said that it is the rule which embeds a discourse of competence (skills of various kinds) into a discourse of social order in such a way that the latter always dominates the former. We shall call the discourse transmitting specialized competences and their relation to each other instructional discourse, and the discourse creating specialized order, relation, and identity regulative discourse. (p, 183)

According to Bernstein, quite crucial to a pedagogic discourse is the recognition that a pedagogic activity is most characteristically marked by its tendency to take the discourse of other settings, from “outside the school” as it were, and to relocate them for the purposes of teaching and learning. That is to say, the discourses of history, science, mathematics, and so on are found in many settings outside the school and they are effectively taken into the school for pedagogic activity. It is considerations of the sequencing and ordering of the transmission

F. Christie

224

and construction of knowledge, and of the kinds of relationships that need to be negotiated in order to make such transmission and construction possible. that determines the nature of the thing that is a pedagogic discourse. As noted earlier, any instance of a lesson is referred to in this article as a curriculum genre (Christie, 1989, 1990, 199 1, 1994, in press), so-called because it is a staged purposeful social activity in which certain pedagogic goals arc realized. It is marked by the operation of two registers constituting two acts ot linguistic choices: a first-order or regulative register and a second-order or instructional register. The term wgister is adopted rather than discourse because ot its significance in the systemic functional linguistic theory used here, although the relation to Bernstein’s meanings is very close. 1The regulative register relates to the overall goals of the activity and to the sequencing of teaching-learning behavior. The instructional register is to do with the field of knowledge or subject being taught. It is the second order or instructional register that is taken from contexts outside school and relocated for the purposes of school practice. The relation of the two registers. as we shall see, is such that the operation of the regulative register determines the manner of realization of the instructional register. Together, the two operate in such a way that they realize the pedagogic discourse. The notion of the two registers. incidentally, bears some relation to Lemke’s (1990) notions of an activity structure and thematic aystcm. as he demonstrated in classroom discourse. PEDAGOGIC CURRICULUM

DISCOURSE IN AN EARLY CHILDHOOD GENRE: THE OPERATION OF THE TWO REGISTERS

In order to demonstrate the ways a linguistic analysis illuminates the operation of a pedagogic discourse, it is proposed to take the opening few clauses from one instance of an early childhood curriculum genre. Using Halliday’s ( 1994) functional grammar. only three aspects of the grammar are examined: (a) the Theme system with particular reference to Textual Theme, (b) the system of Mood and modality, and (c) the system of Transitivity. The sense in which each of these grammatical systems is used is explained later as the operation of each is briefly introduced. The text extract involves an early childhood teacher starting a lesson in which a writing activity was to be developed: an instance of an early childhood vvriting planning genre in fact (Christie, 1989). The extract comes from the opening or Task Orientation element of the curriculum genre. The element is so named because it attempts to capture functional significance of this. the first step in what is a staged, goal-driven purposive social activity. In the Task Orientation, the teacher sat on a chair with the children sitting in a group around her feet: The symbolic significance of the disposition of their bodies was of course important. Text 1: Task Orientation ‘I’:

All from

right,

well

yesterday.

what

we’re

Sinxln

going

(addressed

to do today. to attract

(Extract Only) wc‘rc hi\

going

attention).

to have a look and wc’rc

at our rccipc

going

to make

Pedagogic Discourse

225

from our recipe a shopping list. Now the things that we have to buy for our spaghetti bolognaise are the things that we put on our shopping list. We don’t have to think of anything new, because they’re all written there (She points to the board). The only thing we have to think about is where we would buy them.

To take the issue of Theme first, according to Halliday (1994) this is “the element (in the clause) which serves as the point of departure of the message; it is that with which the clause is concerned” (p. 37). Textual Theme choices, where they occur at all, always come first in a clause and they have a very important role in pointing directions in the construction and sequencing of the discourse. Textual Themes are of two types: those termed continuatives, like “all right,” “now,” or “okay” and those termed structurals, realized in conjunctions, such as “and.” These Themes are crucial to the development of the regulative register, for they help to point directions in the discourse, shaping the learning that is to take place. Examples in the early childhood text fragment include: all right, well what we’re going to do today -and we’re going to make from our recipe a shopping list. now the things that we have to buy for our spaghetti bolognaisc Instances of continuatives in teacher talk tend to cluster at the opening of any new curriculum genre or alternatively at the openings of elements within the genre. Their appearance in children’s talk, at least in the early childhood classroom texts 1 have sampled, is rare (Christie, 1989). However, in more recent analysis in curriculum genres with older students, they have been found to occur extensively in students’ talk, notably at those points in which the students are themselves significantly shaping the directions the discourse, and hence the learning, takes (Christie, 1994). Incidentally, even where the latter pattern occurs it is still the case that continuatives occur in teacher talk at critical stages in which overall directions for learning are being established. Textual Theme choices have a considerable functional significance in the construction of the regulative register. In that they operate primarily in teacher talk in early childhood texts of the kind from which Text 1 is drawn, they serve to underscore the authority of the teacher. On the other hand, their relative infrequency in the students’ talk in the text extract serves to underscore the fact that the students do not on the whole have a role in defining the directions their learning is to take. The students’s subject position in the pedagogic discourse is necessarily realized very differently. Although Textual Theme choices relate primarily to the overall organization of the clauses of the text, those choices that realize Mood and Modality relate much more directly to the nature of the relationship of the participants in the text. Thus, in Text 1, the Mood choice is declarative, building teacher monologue, as the teacher tells the students what is to be done. There is a strong sense of teacher assertion about what is to happen:

226

F. Christie

well what we’re going to do today we’re going to have a look at our recipe

we’re going to make from our recipe a shopping list the things that we have to buy for our spaghetti bolognaise we don’t have to think of anything new. the only thing we have to think about is

This sense of teacher assertion is made the more marked by the use of three instances of high modality employing the modal have: “the things that we huvr to buy for our spaghetti bolognaise”; “ we don’t have to think of anything new”; “the only things we huve to think about.” Finally, turning to Halliday’s description of transitivity, we should note that Halliday identifies six broad types of Transitivity process and their associated Participants and Circumstances. The Process itself is realized in a verbal group, whereas the Participant or Participants are realized in nominal or naming groups, and the Circumstance, where it occurs, is realized in either an adverbial group or a prepositional phrase, as in: she Participant

kicked Process

the ball Participant

in the park Circumstance

Some Processes have to do with material event or action (e.g., “they built a house”); some have to do with behavior (e.g., “we’re looking at a picture”); some have to do with mental activity (e.g., “she believes my story”); some, called relutional processes, are involved in building states of being (e.g., “she is the teacher” or “she is happy”). A significant proportion of the Process types in Text I have to do with realizing aspects of students’ behavior and this is an aspect of the operation of the first-order or regulative register: well what we’re going to do today we’re going to have a look at our recipe we’re going to make from our recipe a shopping list WCdon’t have to think of anything new, the only thing WC have to think about is

Also notable while examining the Transitivity Processes is the fact that the teacher normally uses the pronoun ~VL’ in Participant role in association with each. Thus, she builds solidarity with the students in establishing a common commitment to the tasks at hand. If we arc to turn to the second-order, or instructional register. we can identify this also through the examination of Transitivity. Indeed, it is only in the resources of Transitivity that the instructional register-more accurately the instructional field-is actually realized at this introductory stage in a lesson. WC find that the instructional field-the content to be dealt with-is realized in the Participant roles of Processes or in Circumstances associated with those Processes. For example:

Pedagogic Discourse

227

we’re going to make from our recipe (Circumstance) a shopping list (Participant) Sometimes, a great deal of instructional discourse is packed into embedded clauses (shown with double brackets [[ I]> within Participant roles: [lwhat we’re going to do today]] (is) [[ we’re going to have a look at our recipe from yesterday]], Simon now the things [[that we have to buy for our spaghetti bolognaise]] are the things [[that we put on our shopping list]] the only thing [[that we have to think about]] is [[where we would buy them]] Let me now try to summarize what I have sought to suggest about the operation of the pedagogic discourse by using the example drawn from an early childhood curriculum genre. The pedagogic discourse, we have already noted, involves a principle or set of principles by which the discourses of outside the school are selectively drawn on and relocated for the purposes of teaching and learning. In order to test the principles involved, one needs to find some linguistic evidence. Such evidence can be found if we recognize the operation of a first- and second-order register. The first-order or regulative register has to do with the establishment and sequencing of the activity, whereas the second-order or instructional register has to do with the field of knowledge or content that is being taught. Having established, albeit rather briefly, the claim for a linguistic realization of the two registers that build a pedagogic discourse, I devote the rest of the article to addressing the broader question of how a curriculum macrogenre is realized, and I do this by reference to a different text. PEDAGOGIC DISCOURSE IN AN UPPER PRIMARY SOCIAL SCIENCE MACROGENRE A curriculum macrogenre is so called because it refers to the overall sequence or cycle of lessons in which a unit of work is developed with a group of students: such a sequence will normally involve several genres, constituting the unit which is the macrogenre. The unit of work I examine here was drawn from the upper primary social science program in a school in the northern Australian city of Darwin. It should be noted that in developing an account of one curriculum macrogenre of the upper primary social science school, it is not claimed that this is the only such macrogenre that may be found. The instance reported here is drawn from a quite substantial body of data (Christie, 1994, in press) in which teachers and classes in five different primary schools were studied intensively over a period of 3 years. Macrogenres were collected involving the teaching of social science, science, English, and mathematics. A further study (Christie ongoing) currently involves examination of curriculum macrogenres in the secondary school: in 1995, the target subject is English, whereas projected subjects for 1996 and 1997 are the social sciences and the national sciences. It is worth noting as well that several others using systemic functional linguistic theory

Orilion

tian

@2&-

Wtkn Figure

Calf.

Coti.

1” S~cCalscience curricvlwm mdcrogenre

GOif.

icuiummcrwnre

Pedagogic Discourse

229

(e.g., Gerot, 1989) have developed or are developing parallel work to that reported in this article on curriculum macrogenres. Nonetheless, although the analysis here can claim to be based on a quite considerable body of data, it needs to be stated that a great deal of additional research is required in order to identify other curriculum macrogenres and in order to arrive at what may represent something of a taxonomy of such macrogenres. The unit of work in the selected social science program examined involved the imagined appearance in the major local newspaper of an advertisement proposing the construction of a nuclear power station in Darwin and seeking written submissions on the subject. The issue of nuclear power is in fact an important one in this part of Australia, as uranium mining is permitted, although its propriety continues to attract considerable public debate. The object of the unit of study was that the students should read the advertisement, develop some sense of the nature of the subject and of the arguments for or against developing such a power station, and write persuasive genres about it. The five lessons were video recorded and they were collected at intervals over 3 weeks, constituting most but not all of the lessons taught on the subject. Permission to record these lessons was negotiated with the teacher, who had been asked to allow recording of the introductory lesson or lessons, the closing lesson or lessons, and at least some of the “middle” of the cycle. Field notes providing additional details about the classroom, students, and teaching arrangements were kept as were the details of interviews with the teacher. The macrogenre may be represented as in Figure 1. Three genres are identified: (a) the Curriculum Initiation, (b) the Curriculum Negotiation, and (c) the Curriculum Closure. In a manner consistent with other descriptions of genres in the systemic functional tradition (see Martin, 1985, for a discussion of principles involved in identifying genres and their features), each genre and its elements are labeled in a manner intended to suggest their functional significance in the overall structure and unfolding of the macrogenre. Thus, the Curriculum Initiation involves the opening step in which broad pedagogic goals are established with respect to a particular instructional field. Here, the Curriculum Initiation has three elements: (a) an opening or Task Orientation, (b) a subsequent Task Specification in which the task for writing with respect to the instructional field is established, and (c) a Task Deconstruction in which a sample of the target text, type, or genre to be written is deconstructed. The Curriculum Negotiation has several genres within it, each labeled a tusk collaboration. In each of these three, aspects of the pedagogic task for writing a discussion genre on the one hand and aspects of the instructional field of nuclear power stations on the other hand are explored. In this sense, both registers are foregrounded at different points, as the students move between considerations of how to write and what to write about. In the Curriculum Closure, the two registers converge successfully as the students discuss the draft versions of their discussion genres with their teacher: This is labeled the Tusk Druft. Finally, with the emergence of the completed written discussion genres in the Tusk Finis

230

F. Christie

element, the instructional register is foregrounded, whereas the regulative rcgister is no longer realized in the text. Thus, as I would hope to demonstrate, the students have been successfully apprenticed into an understanding of aspects of the field of knowledge of nuclear energy and into an understanding of at least one relevant genre in which to construct such knowledge. The measure of the success of this initiation is that the regulative register is no longer realized: Its work has been done and the students operate with competence and independence. The patterns of discourse in which these things are realized across such an extended sequence of lessons are marked by considerable linguistic diversity. Along the way, there are marked shifts from overt teacher direction, to joint construction of aspects of the instructional field or of the regulative field, to independent construction. The shifts are also apparent in changes in mode: Sometimes the discourse is entirely oral: elsewhere, it involves an important interplay between oral and written language, either as students and teacher construct information, on the board, or as they read and discuss written materials; elsewhere, it is entirely written, as for example, at the end of the cycle, when the students have produced their written texts. The Curriculum Initiation At the opening of the Task Orientation (the first element of the curriculum initiation), the first-order or regulative register is foregrounded. Indeed, unlike what happened in the previous early childhood text, the second-order or instructional field finds no expression in the text at all. The Textual Theme choices build direction of behavior (now~, SO, hut), whereas Process types, many of them relational (might be, will be) are primarily involved in building aspects of the manner in which students are to work. Interpersonally, a great deal of effort on the teacher’s part goes into establishing working relations for the students. Here the Modality is very marked in her discourse (modal items are shown in bold): The way to work might be to sit around this group. All right’! Because perhaps people will bc (inaudible) and less wriggling if they’re seated. Now a lot of work l[that you may have to do]] may be with a partner. Some you’ll do by yourself. So you’re probably best to sit next to somebody [[that you will work with]]. OK? Now, two, four, six. eight there’s one person away today so maybe it might be a group of three. All right‘? It’s up to you. But could you find yourself a seat around the desks and be sitting next to someone that you will identify to work with please? If you two arc going to work together there’ll have to be one odd person sitting there . ok‘! So move down one please.

The teacher is very obliquely directing the students toward their task. There is one instance of an imperative, somewhat softened by the addition of the modal adjunct “please”: so move down one plcasc The teacher is in her own way very concerned to establish working relationships, but her means of establishing control are often more indirect than is true of

Pedagogic Discourse

231

early childhood teachers. This probably reflects, in part, the fact that she is dealing with much older students and recognizes that she will be more successful if she seeks their cooperation rather than overtly orders them to do their work. In addition, it reflects her concern to set up a congenial working relationship, one on which a great deal of what is to be taught and learned will be negotiated. At issue is her very strong expectation and requirement that the students cooperate. A value is at work here, to do both with establishing respect for the teacher and with the values of the students respecting each other and learning to work together harmoniously. Such a value is constantly affirmed through the regulative register. It has consequences for the building of the pedagogic subject, and by extension, of the institutionalized subject who will not only continue to function in school for some years yet, but who also will enter the work force and the wider community. Later in the Task Orientation element, after the teacher and students have read the advertisement, the preliminary talk of the consequences of a nuclear station leads to the Task Specification in which language of the regulative register is foregrounded, whereas the second-order or instructional language is realized in other ways. It should be noted that in the following extract, as elsewhere in this article, a row of dots indicates that part of the discourse has been removed: Well what are we going to do? We’re going to write and tell them that we don’t want the power plant. T: All right. What are we going to write’? Richard: Personal opinion. T: How are we going to write it? .I......._.......................__..._,.._.. Layla: Well a petition might help. If there are people who don’t actually have the time to write they could just sign their names so they know actually how many people T:

Marcus:

. . . . . . . . . ..I......... Richard: T: Marcus: T: Ashley: T: Marcus: T: Richard: T: Richard:

Maybe we could write like an argument or something that shows both points of view and putting your own personal opinion at the end. Great. Now is it actually called an argument when you put both points of view across? Is it? Mrs W. a discussion It’s a discussion. All right. Now what does a discussion show? What does a discussion show Ashley? Two side of a story and it sort of like depends on which side wins. OK. And how do you decide which side wins? When you give a discussion how do you know what side wins? By the one that goes last. Like you put the one that you think is wrong before. But how do you decide that? What gives you how do you know which one to decide? Richard? Because after listening to all the information you found out you can make up your own mind if it benefits you or if it benefits other people. Good. So you’re saying that’s it’s the information that tells you? Yeah.

232

F. Christie

The reference to writing a discussion, it should be noted, comes from earlier work done in this class using discussion genres as they have been contrasted with argumentative genres in Australian work on written genres (Metropolitan East Disadvantaged Schools Program, 1989). Discussion genres stand in contrast to expositions in that the latter involve the construction of one position, argued by reference to evidence. Discussions, valued in schools (but also in some tertiary studies) in a number of subjects, are genres in which a preview of an issue is offered and arguments for and against the issue are then developed, after which the writer concludes by expressing his or her own point of view. In the extract examined from the Task Orientation, apart from the reference to the power plant in one Participant role (“we don’t want the power plant”). the language on the whole realizes the regulative register as teacher and students together construct a sense of what they may do. Thus, several Process types realize aspects of the students’ behaviors, all of them directed toward the goals of the teaching-learning activity: We’re going to write and tell them that WC don’t want the power plant. Maybe we could write like an argument or something. Because after listening to all the information you found out you can make up your own mind. Operating in Participant roles in several key points is a developing for handling the writing task:

language

Maybe we could write like an argument or something [[that shows both points of view]] and putting your own personal opinion at the end. Now is it actually called an argument when you put both points of view across’! Is it? Marcus: Mrs W., a discussion T: It’s a discussion. All right. Now what does a discussion show’? interpersonally, the text is of interest for the modality in the children’s talk, indicating that they are aware that they are engaged in some exploratory activity: Well a petition might help. Maybe WCcould write like an argument. Textually,

the teacher’s

edness in the construction

role remains important in helping to build the connectof the information here:

Well what are we gomg to do? Now is it actually called an argument when you put both points of view across’? Is it’? Now what does a discussion show’! And how do you decide which side wins’! When you give a discussion how do you know what side wins? But how do you decide that? So you’re saying that it’s the information that tells you?

Pedagogic Discourse

233

Looking in particular at the operation of the conjunctions here (and, when, but, and so), we can see that the teacher’s role helps shape the logic that the discourse takes as well. Overall, a primary object of the Task Specification is to establish what is to be done and some of the technical language with which to handle it. A particular set of values about the nature of evidence and research is also at issue, as is apparent when a little later in the discourse the teacher makes use of strong attitudinal expression, here marked in bold:

Several students:

Do you make up your mind now’? No See, when we first started talking that’s what 1 felt you had done. All right, because maybe of that story we read. 1 felt that maybe you’d made your mind up and it’s really good to see that people actually haven’t made their mind up and that they’re prepared to look at both sides. And it’s that evidence that’11tell us. And 1 think writing a discussion is an excellent idea. It’s probably the best idea. Because when we send that in it means we’ve been fair. We’ve looked at it properly, we’ve looked at both sides and we’ve thought about it before we’ve made the decision.

Thus is the pedagogic subject position also constructed in the text with a particular set of values concerning recourse to evidence being appealed to. Before I leave this element of the macrogenre, I should perhaps note that the language of the regulative register is at this point entirely devoted to the task at hand. The preoccupation with physical dispositions of students that we saw, which was such a marked feature of the teacher’s opening, has disappeared in the opening. Here we can conclude with Green and Kantor-Smith (1988) that the principles of appropriate behavior having been established they have now been internalized and they therefore find no explicit expression in the text. This is itself another aspect of the building of the institutionalized being: in this case, a being who cooperates by working harmoniously alongside others. Text Deconstruction In the Text Deconstruction

stage, the object is that the students identify the elements of the target discussion genre they are to write, by reference to an actual example they are read, and deconstruct. Here again, it is the regulative register that is foregrounded. Interpersonally, the teacher overtly invites joint participation with her in the task with an inclusive imperative: Now let’s have a look . . . , Processes sion”),

and Participant

realize

aspects

roles, and in one case a Circumstance

of the metalanguage

for talking

(“in a discusabout discussion genres:

234

F. Christie

T:

Now

let’s

have

structured. you’re They

Layla:

Right.

T:

a look

and

see if WC can

work

out

how

a discussion

is

OK‘? We’ve identified the issue. What other things are there that of in a discussion?

aware

Layla?

have an introduction Yes they have an introduction.

It has a special name.

..,.....,.

It’s a preview, kind of preview.

Richard: Asked

what

Marcus:

this means,

the students

go on:

I was gx~ing to say previews are [[like telling you [[what it’s going to be about11 11

Subsequent elements in the discussion genre are established in a passage too long to show here: arguments for a point of view, arguments against a point of view, and a final recommendation. Space does not permit any detailed examination of those aspects of the total text that constitute the Curriculum Negotiation. Note, however, that within thih overall genre, discussion focuses sometimes on the language of the genre for writing, foregrounding the regulative register, and sometimes on the field for investigation and for writing about. In the latter cases, it is the instructional register that is foregrounded. To take the former first, at one point students and teacher talk about the nature of some of the language choices in which a discussion genre is constructed by reference to another example. Having already talked about the overall structure of a discussion genre, the children turn to talk of the uses of the present tense and its role in the text. Later, they turn to the particular sets of conjunctions that appear most characteristic of the discussion genres they have been deconstructing and hence most characteristic of the kinds of reasoning found in such a genre. Here again. aspects of the technical language necessary for a control of the regulative field are realized especially in Participant roles: .I‘: The first group (of conjunctions) from memory showed Phillip: 1‘:

Marcus: Anita:

time. While,

Phillip.

WC called

can you just read the ones that show

them temporal

and the)

time please’!

after and bcforc.

Allright.

The next group arc comparative.

What

dots

comparative

IIIGIII

Marcus’! More’? Comparing

things.

Later on, extensive amounts of time arc devoted to collection and reading of materials on the uses, advantages. and disadvantages of nuclear power. The best way to capture some sense of this is to indicate the grid developed on the board in negotiation between teacher and students, with which the students are encouraged to summarize the results of their discussions and their research. Table I provides a framework with which to build the necessary instructional field information and which the students can eventually use to draw on in writing their

235

Pedagogic Discourse

TABLE 1

Energy Source

How Is It Obtained?

Is It a Finite Supply?

Emissions

Expenses

Other Problems

Gas

Oil Hydro Nuclear Solar Alternatives Wind Tidal Geothermal

discussion genres. It also provides a set of principles by which information is researched and marshaled. Once again, it is in that sense that at quite a deep level the students involved here are being initiated into ways of working and of addressing questions. These ways represent both a means to address questions, and by implication, the building of a particular pedagogic subject position. Curriculum Closure The Curriculum Closure involves a review of the draft discussion genres that the students wrote individually and comparing them with the models used to analyze and deconstruct. After some group discussion, they are to edit their own texts before typing them up. Discussion of the introductory preview and its function leads to talk of ways to introduce the different points of view. Here too, the regulative field is foregrounded, as the students talk of appropriate expressions to signal the start of a new point of view: Richard:

Layla: Penny:

I thought it would be on the other side. On the other side of the argument many people believe On the other hand. . . .

Later discussion turns to how a decision is made on the nature of the recommendation and again the regulative field is foregrounded. Here, students articulate appropriate behaviors, realized in particular in the Transitivity choices:

236 T: Marcus:

F. Christie Now how do you decide on your recommendation? By reading through the argument

Marcus?

Penny: T:

By what’s stronger. How do you know it’s stronger? How will you decide it’s stronger’?

Penny:

Well the benefits should outweigh the effects or the effects should outweigh the benefits.

THE DISCUSSION

GENRES

Two examples of texts written by students in the class are examined here, illustrating the type of discussion genre produced. It is noted that it is apparent that the two texts not only have very similar overall schematic structures, but also that a great deal of the language they use is very similar. It may be suggested then. because the two students are caused to draw so heavily on the same languageprovided by the teacher through guided reading, classroom talk, and modeling of appropriate sentences-that they are not acting independently or that they are merely copying what they have been given by the teacher. Such a suggestion deserves some attention as the two texts are examined because the attempt to answer it helps to clarify even further what is involved in the process of becoming the pedagogic subject, at least for the purposes of this curriculum macrogenre. As will be seen later, a number of instances of the same or very similar nominal groups are present in the two texts: nucleur,fueled power station or ,fossiifired power stations, the environmet~t, nuclear wuste. pollutiotz, radiution, and electricity, One would expect to see a common use of such lexical items because they represent important aspects of the technical language of the field of instructional knowledge about which the students have been learning. Their presence in both texts is one measure of the fact that both students are comfortable with the technical language of the instructional field. In this sense, the presence of a similar set of principal lexical items is both inevitable and even desirable. Turning to the sentences found in the two texts, we can also see that there are similarities, more marked in some elements of structure than in others. Thus, the two elements labeled Preview are essentially the same. The two are set out, incidentally, sentence by sentence, to enable ease of comparison: Preview Text 3 Some people believe we should have a nuclear fuclled power station in Darwin because it’s cheaper and does not pollute the environment much as fossil fired power stations.

Text 4 There arc some people who believe we should have a nuclear power station because it’s cheaper and does not pollute the environment as much as fossil fuelled power station\.

237

Pedagogic Discourse

However, other people don’t want a nuclear fuelled power plant.

They feel it is unsafe, due to recent accidents and problems of disposal with nuclear waste materials harmful to the environment.

However other people do not want a nuclear fuelled power station. They feel it is unsafe due to accidents and problems with disposal of radioactive waste materials that are harmful to the environment.

The strong similarity of the two opening elements reflects the fact that the students have followed very closely the model of how to structure the opening element suggested to them in joint construction with their teacher. Given that they are being inducted or apprenticed into the writing of a genre with such an opening element, it is not surprising that they have used the language scaffolded for them by their teacher. They are preparing for the eventual step of more independent behavior. The independence with which the students go on to deploy the language available to them becomes more of an issue when they proceed into construction of the relevant sets of arguments in those elements labeled Arguments 1 and 2. Here, as already noted, it is apparent that they use a great deal of technical language in common. Within the first Argument element in each case, two sentences (marked in bold) appear that are very similar. However, it is noted that they are deployed at different points in the element in each case, indicating they are used with different roles in the construction of the overall logic of the two texts: Argument 1 Text 3 In western countries nuclear power reactors have 3 main barriers to prevent leakage.

At Chernobyl where a major accident did occur, they had no 3rd barrier to prevent radiation leakage into the the environment. Some countries with nuclear power stations are recycling the waste heat from the nuclear power reactor.

Text 4

Some people say that nuclear power is better than fossil fuels because it is safer cleaner and cheaper. In western countries nuclear power reactors have three main barriers to prevent leakage of radiation. At Chernobyl where a major accident occurred they had no third harrier to prevent radiation leaking into the environment.

t: Christie

238

The waste

Maybe

is used for household

because

breeding

technology.

and heating

for

barrier

they had no third

heating, heating water for fish

of money

and

greenhouses. Two-thirds

of France‘s

gcncratcd

from

electricity

nuclear

is

Nuclear

power.

powcr

cleaner

than

plants

are

l’ossil fired

plants. Because

nuclear

country

pays

is cheaper

the

one of the lowcst

all of the industrial&d

costs

countries

in

for

Nuclear

power

release

as much

that means

clcctricity.

stations

do not

pollution

and

it is not as

damaging

to humans

and

environments. In France

two thirds

of their

electricity

is cheaper

than

western

countries

fired power uranium

most

that use fossil

stations

because

is cheaper

than

fossil

fuels e.g oil. coal and gas.

Within the second Argument elements, the two texts nonetheless show greater pursue

different

although there is still a deal in common, divergence as the two writers take up and

lines:

Argument 2 Text 4

Text 3 On the other radioactive

hand,

nuclear

for thousands

waste

stays

On the other is not safe,

burial

clean.

Nuclear

be guaranteed.

reactors

of dollars But after

Nuclear

cost millions

active

to build. 30 to 40 years

and need to be disposed

they’re

no good

of.

billion

dollars.

to 4

and

will remain

for thousands

The safest

methods

of deep

be 100% guaranteed

against

natural

Building power

e.g.

events

burial

in

earthquakes.

and running station

radio

of years.

cannot

the future This can cost up to 20 million

cheap

waste

people

power

say that nuclear

of years

and even the safest methods of deep can’t

side some

a nuclear

is not cheap.

Pedagogic Discourse Some of the nuclear waste is put in metal containers and dumped in the sea.

But it is not safe because eventually the metal corrodes and the waste leaks and affects the fish.

239

Solar power stations in the United States cost half a billion dollars to build and electricity costs $500 per kilowatt. Nuclear power is not clean because of the danger of radioactive waste and materials. The radioactive waste is very dangerous to humans and the environment. With humans it can cause cancer and deformities in unborn babies and large amounts of radiation can be deadly.

it is in the concluding elements labeled Recommendation that the divergence between the two texts is most marked because one writer adopts the position that a nuclear power station is desirable, whereas the other adopts the view that it is not: Finally,

Recommendation Text 3 There are many reasons on both sides of the argument for having a nuclear power station.

Text 4 Thus, in summary, both sides put forward convincing arguments.

Though I’m aware of the dangers 1 believe that modern day technology can dispose of the nuclear waste safely.

Nuclear power is an alternative to fossil fuel because our supply is running out but at the moment Darwin does not need a nuclear power station.

I strongly believe we should have nuclear power station and save our fossil fuels.

Therefore I believe a power station is not needed in Darwin because of the danger involved with nuclear power,

Overall, it can be said that both students have successfully produced the target genre. Moreover, both demonstrate a reasonable control of the instructional field or content about which they have been asked to write. The two students demon-

240

F. Christie

strate that they rely on similar uses of language and one would expect that, given that the instructional field being constructed in both cases is the same. In that the two students employ some sentences in common, especially in writing their opening Preview elements, it is apparent that they need to draw on the teacher’s manner of modeling this in order to launch them both into writing their texts. However, beyond that, even noting the similarity of two sentences found in the first elements of Arguments I and 2, we have seen that the two students have demonstrated capacity to deploy the same basic technical language and the same basic generic structure in order to construct two fundamentally differing points of view about the wisdom of constructing a nuclear power station in Darwin. In this sense, their capacity to act independently. at least with respect to this instructional field, seems well established. Thus, aspects of the students’ subjectivity have been constructed in the pedagogic discourse. The latter point is a very important one. That is because it brings to the forefront the issue of what constitutes the ways in which persons attain the capacities for marshaling information and for addressing socially significant issues that the teacher indicated more than once in the discourse she was trying to shape. No one is launched fully independent as a language user without a great deal of scaffolding of appropriate language and a great deal of reliance on the models of others, as Gray (1987). for example. very successfully demonstrated with respect to the learning of language in the early years. Indeed, in order to act with the independence actually valued in an English-speaking culture of a kind which the teacher reflects in her talk, students need to master the conventional practices available in the culture so that they can both manipulate these with facility and. in which the occasion merits it, break these patterns and shape new ones. Hence, the students in the curriculum macrogenre or cycle examined in this article both draw heavily on the linguistic resources made available to them through their teacher’s intervention and they act with independence of each other. in that they ultimately adopt different positions.

CONCLUSION This article began by referring to earlier work on classroom discourse analysis. Such earlier work drew attention, among other things, to the assymetrical pattern of classroom talk-a pattern which has persisted despite calls from some cducationists at least for teachers, to adopt alternative strategies. I argued that if we are to get clearer about the nature of talk in schools we need more powerful methods of analysis than have always been available in the past. We need methods that will penetrate and explain the sets of social practices involved in the discourses 01 schooling and hence help to explain the institution of schooling and its meanings. A method of pedagogic discourse analysis of the kind I described allows us to separate in the discourse those aspects of the language that relate to the educational goals and to the general management of students’ behavior and those

Pedagogic Discourse

241

aspects that relate to the knowledge or information being learned. Following Bernstein, I suggested that what is at issue in the operation of a pedagogic discourse is a set of principles by which students are inducted into ways of working valued in the wider culture. Such ways of working, although found in many places in an English-speaking culture, may nonetheless be generally characterized as representing “disciplined” approaches to the construction of knowledge. They are disciplined in the oldest sense in that they involve development of habits and skills of dealing with experience that take time and perseverance to master. Development of such habits and skills on the part of the novice requires the assistance of a mentor: one who can anticipate the learning needs ahead and help the novice chart his or her course. In the process of the development of the necessary habits and skills of dealing with experience, a pedagogic subject position may be said to take shape-one which, among other matters, involves persons entering with understanding into the common knowledge of a culture. As we get better at identifying and discussing the pedagogic discourse in which such pedagogic subjects are shaped and developed, we may very well learn a new respect for the craft of teaching and for the dignity of a teaching profession regrettably often criticized because it is not necessarily well understood. Endnote I, In earlier discussions, I used the terms pedagogic and content registers. A decision has since been made to retain Bernstein’s terms. REFERENCES Bernstein, B. (1986). On pedagogic discourse. In J. Richardson (Ed.), Handbook of theory and research in sociology of educarion (pp. 205-239). Westport, CT: Greenwood. Bernstein, B. (1990). The structuring of pedagogic discourse: Gloss codes and control (Vol. IV). London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Bernstein, B. (1994, August). The pedagogic device. Paper presented at the 21st meeting of the International Systemic Functional Linguistics Association Congress, University of Ghent. Brilliant-Mills, H. (1993). Becoming a mathematician: Building a situated definition of mathematics. Linguistics and Education, 5. 301-334. Cazden, C. (1986). Classroom discourse. In M.C. Wittrock (Ed.), Handbook ofresearch on teaching (pp. 432-463). New York: Macmillan. Christie, F. (1989). Curriculum genres in early childhood education: A case .studJ in wiring development. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Sydney. Christie, F. (1990). First and second order registers in education. In E. Ventola (Ed.), Functional and systemic linguistics: Approaches and uses (pp. 235-258). Berlin: deGruyter. Christie, F. (1991). Pedagogical and content registers in a writing lesson. Linguisfics and Education, 3. 203-224. Christie, F. (1994). On pedagogic discourse. Final report of a research activity funded by the Australian Research Council. Christie, F. (in press). Science and apprenticeship: The pedagogic discourse. In J.R. Martin & R. Veel (Eds.), The discourse of science.

242

E Christie