Mediation and development of a novice L2 writing teacher's pedagogical content knowledge of genre

Abstract

In addition to the benefits genre-based writing pedagogies provide to L2 students, proponents have argued that such pedagogies can empower writing teachers by making teachers' genre knowledge central to classroom instruction. Yet genre proponents also recognize that genre-based pedagogies demand far greater levels of content knowledge than process pedagogies, especially given the fact that EAP writing teachers are frequently called on to teach previously unfamiliar genres to students. However, empirical studies of how teachers develop knowledge of the genres they teach remain rare in the literature. The present research addresses this need by presenting a case study of how one teacher came to understand a previously unknown pedagogical genre – the analytic essay – through the process of teaching it for the first time. Drawing on the concept of pedagogical content knowledge from the teacher education literature and using interviews, video-recordings of classroom teaching, and stimulated recalls, this article will demonstrate how the teacher's conception of the genre developed through her interactions with her students and collaborative reflection with the researcher. Implications for L2 writing teacher education and supervision will be explored.