Realization(s): Systemic-Functional Linguistics and the Language Classroom
FINAL COMMENTS
In conducting this research, we experienced an enlightening opportunity to spend time with these two teachers, and to reflect on and discuss their knowledge and practice. In doing so, we better understood Sandra and Bobbi, not just as teachers, but as people: people who teach, who have distinct personalities, personal lives, problems and pleasures.
Although, it seems self-evident, one of the main lessons we have absorbed from our research is that it cannot be assumed that teaching Masters courses in SFL will lead to teachers using it in their classrooms. The research has allowed us to probe the realities and flaws in our previous assumptions and to reflect seriously on their implications. We now feel strongly that teacher educators teaching SFL (and probably any other forms of grammatical KAL) need to provide their students with explicit tools for pedagogy, in combination with the grammatical tools themselves. This goal might be effectively achieved by scaffolding pedagogical uses of SFL for the students, using the principles outlined for SFL pedagogy, such as building knowledge of patterns of classroom interaction, and demonstrating explicit models. We are not proposing giving students additional knowledge about SFL in the sense of ‘more about the grammatical system’. Rather we are suggesting that students could be apprenticed into practical applications through grounded and contextualized action and problem-based activities alongside their theoretical developments in KAL.
Clearly, more research in classrooms is needed to understand how SFL pedagogy is realized by teachers who have undertaken courses, through classroom observation and investigations of their underlying thinking. Additionally, and perhaps even more importantly, more research is needed, by teacher educators: to analyze their own practice, develop their thinking about teaching KAL and to gain awareness of what impact their teaching has on their students’ practices. This type of research is not commonly a feature of teacher educator practice, but we hope that our study provides an initial contribution.
