Abstract
First-year students experience a range of challenges when transferring from secondary to higher education (HE) (cf. Darlaston-Jones et al. 2003, Leki 2006, Brinkworth et al. 2009). This is no different in South Africa, where deviating levels of preparedness for the demands of HE is a recurring theme (Slonimsky and Shalem 2005, Van Schalkwyk 2008, Scott 2009, Yeld 2009, Van Dyk 2010, Van Dyk and Coetzee-Van Rooy 2012). Weideman (2003:56) rightfully points out that the inability to understand and utilise appropriate academic discourse has a detrimental effect on academic success. Young students need to acculturate to the academic environment while adopting the academic community’s currency (Van de Poel and Gasiorek 2012a:294). With this article, we wish to contribute to the discussion by reporting on the academic language ability of one group of first-year students at a South African university, with specific reference to these students’ reading ability, on the basis of the following data: (i) individual differences in terms of learner characteristics (race, first language, gender, Grade 12 results, academic performance); (ii) self-reported reading preparedness, and (iii) reading profiles resulting from a valid and reliable academic literacy test, the Test of Academic Literacy Levels (TALL) and its Afrikaans counterpart, the Toets van Akademiese Geletterdheidsvlakke (TAG). The findings suggest that academic reading ability, as reflected in the test results, is indeed one of the salient contributors to academic success (as confirmed in the literature), regardless of social and individual differences, and that it needs to be supported in order for students to perceive their reading ability in accordance with their reading performance and be able to progress in their academic acculturation. A follow-up study will report on students’ awareness-raising about their own academic reading through the use of the validated scale for Perceived Academic Reading Preparedness (PARP) as a pedagogical tool.
Highlights
It has been reiterated in both international and local research literature that the transition from secondary to higher education (HE) is not just a change of physical environment, and a change of culture that, in many cases, may result in a high drop-out rate, during the first year of study
Perhaps the most salient is that first-year students who just arrived at university, on average, have a positive perception of their academic preparedness, and their reading preparedness in particular
It was shown that undergraduates, and first-year students in particular, do not adequately assess their own academic competencies – as shown by their perceived academic reading preparedness – and that they struggle to comply with the academic demands associated with university study
Summary
It has been reiterated in both international and local research literature that the transition from secondary to higher education (HE) is not just a change of physical environment, and a change of culture that, in many cases, may result in a high drop-out rate, during the first year of study (cf. Brinkworth et al 2009; Darlaston-Jones et al 2003; Foxcroft and Stumpf 2005; Kuh et al 2007; Scott 2009; Scott, Yeld and Hendry 2007; Slonimsky and Shalem 2005; Van de Poel and Gasiorek 2012a, 2012b; Van Dyk 2010; Van Dyk and Coetzee-Van Rooy 2012; Van Schalkwyk 2008; Yeld 2009). It is widely accepted that the academic performance and motivation of first-year students to stay in HE depend, amongst others, on how well they integrate into the university environment (Brinkworth et al 2009:168). Integration, within the scope of this article, is defined as the ability (and motivation) of students to negotiate, assimilate, understand, embrace, interact and engage with academic discourse in all its diversity, which – in turn – relies on Hyland’s (2009:1) definition of academic discourse as “the ways of thinking and using language which exist in the academy”. In other words, have to conform to the academic community’s communicative currency: the norms, standards, procedures and linguistic forms that constitute academic discourse (cf Duff 2010; Hyland 2009; Gee 1998, 2000; Van de Poel and Gasiorek 2012a:294). When students are adequately literate, they will be able to activate the knowledge and skills required to communicate and function in the academic environment and become acculturated and potentially successful
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