Table Of ContentEnhancing Student
Support in Higher
Education
A Subject-Focused
Approach
nick pilcher
kendall richards
Enhancing Student Support in Higher Education
Nick Pilcher • Kendall Richards
Enhancing Student
Support in Higher
Education
A Subject-Focused Approach
Nick Pilcher Kendall Richards
The Business School, Craiglockhart School of Computing, Merchiston
Edinburgh Napier University Edinburgh Napier University
Edinburgh, UK Edinburgh, UK
ISBN 978-3-030-81723-7 ISBN 978-3-030-81724-4 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-81724-4
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature
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List of Figures
Fig. 5.1 Rhizome. (Source: David Richards) 63
Fig. 5.2 Teapot. (Source: David Richards) 73
ix
Contents
1 Introduction 1
2 C ontext 5
References 19
3 The Roots and Branches of Linguistics 23
The Birth of Linguistics 23
The Parameters and Stipulations Underpinning the Birth
of Linguistics 25
The Implications of Having the Parameters for Analysing
and Teaching Language 27
How Student Support Is Guided by the Parameters of
Linguistics 30
Systemic Functional Linguistics and Genre Analysis 30
Corpus Linguistics 34
Academic Literacies 35
The Benefits of Using Non-text Language Based Approaches
Alongside Written Text Ones 36
References 38
v
vi Contents
4 The View of Language Through the Paradigm of Linguistics 41
Introduction 41
Defining a Paradigm 42
Outline of Kuhn’s Paradigm Theory; Critiques and
Incommensurability 43
The Paradigm of Linguistics—Foundations and Characteristics 45
The Sources of Our Rejections 46
The Paradigm of Linguistics 59
References 60
5 Our Projects and Data 61
Introduction 61
Rhizome 62
A Rhizome Is Planted 64
References 75
6 Examples Considered from Our Past and Present
Perspectives 79
Introduction 79
Approaches Through Written Text Informed and Based
Materials 80
Approaches That Focus on the Subject and Draw on
a Range of Languages 81
Conclusion 91
Additional Examples 93
References 96
7 I mplications with the Different Approaches 97
Introduction 97
References 108
8 F ocusing on the Subject 111
Introduction 111
Establishing Relationships with Students and Lecturers 114
Promotion and Communication of the Nature of Subject
Based Support 119
Contents vii
Evaluating Impact 124
Resource Implications 125
Separate In-sessional and Pre-sessional Classes 128
References 129
9 Conclusion 133
Introduction 133
Reference 144
Appendix: Chapter 6 Examples and Our Suggestions 145
Author Index 153
Subject Index 155
1
Introduction
It is the central argument of this book that support for students has, to
date, always started from the outset of written text based and informed
approaches and products, whereas we argue that it should instead start
from the outset by looking at the subject assignments and tasks the stu-
dents are asked to do. By written text based and informed approaches we
mean support that is developed from theories, such as Systemic Functional
Linguistics, and encompasses areas such as English for Academic Purposes
and Academic Literacies. What we are not arguing is that written text
based and informed approaches are useless, quite the opposite, we draw
on and use our knowledge from such approaches ourselves and describe
so in the book. Rather, we are arguing that such approaches, if seen as the
only ones that students need, have a danger of being unable to see and
acknowledge the importance of other languages, such as visual languages
and emotional languages, and of mathematics. What is more, we argue
that if the approach is centred on written text based and informed
approaches and gets students to learn these, there may be adverse impli-
cations, for example, of cognitive overload, where the students are unable
to memorize subject content because they are being asked to do too many
tasks at the same time (e.g. textual analytical methods as well as content
© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 1
N. Pilcher, K. Richards, Enhancing Student Support in Higher Education,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-81724-4_1
2 N. Pilcher and K. Richards
identification). Also, there may be tasks that students need to do where
written text is not important or grammar and spelling do not signifi-
cantly impact on the grade they receive.
Instead, what we are arguing for is a subject focused approach to sup-
port that draws on appropriate written text based and informed
approaches as well as other languages and underlying elements to focus
on the subjects and assignments that students are asked to do. In order to
argue the case for such an approach we need to make the following argu-
ments. First, we need to provide a context and justification for how we
have developed in how we support students in the way we now do, and
this is outlined in Chap. 2. Second, we need to make the case for why
current approaches start from the outset of written text based and
informed approaches and what the parameters for these are, and this we
do in Chap. 3 where we look at the roots and branches of how linguistics
as a science was established. Third, to outline how these roots and
branches mean that support is seen through the ‘paradigm’ or ‘lens’ of
linguistics, what these are, and how these mean that other approaches to
support will be seen as unnecessary. We make this argument in Chap. 4
where we outline what we call the ‘paradigm of linguistics’ and highlight
a number of tenets that are held to in order to support the idea that writ-
ten text based and informed approaches are, alone, what students need.
Fourth, we make the argument that there is much more to what students
need to communicate and do than written text alone (such as the use of
visual language and emotional language) and, critically, that it is not pos-
sible to find out what students need to do through analysing written texts
alone. Rather, lecturers and students need to be consulted, and critically,
key psychological and ideological elements will exist under the surface of
the written text that can only be discovered through dialogue with sub-
ject lecturers (and students). We make this argument in Chap. 5 where,
by drawing on theory and our own research projects, we describe how we
have changed in our approaches to support students by focusing on the
subject rather than on written text based and informed approaches (which
we previously did) alone.
Fifth, we then substantiate this theoretical argument and present a
number of examples from our own practice. In these examples, we first
present what the situation or scenario is (e.g. Music students doing one of
